THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
 1
 
 THE IDOLATRESS: 
 
 %uii §t\m 1^0cms.
 
 %
 
 THE IDOLATRESS 
 
 inh 0i^n |0ms. 
 
 By JAMES WILLS, D.D., M.RJ.A. 
 
 ' ' With these in troop 
 Came Astoreth, whom the Phoenicians called 
 Astarte, Queen of Heaven, with crescent horns ; 
 To whose bright image nightly by the moon 
 Sidonian virgins made their vows and songs, 
 In Sion also not unsung, where stood 
 Her temple on the offensive mountain, built 
 By that uxorious king, whose heart, though large, 
 Beguiled by fair idolatresses, fell 
 To idols foul. " 
 
 Milton's Paradise Lost, i., 437—446. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 FOR THE AUTHOR, 
 
 JOHN CAMDEN HOTTEN, PICCADILLY. 
 
 1868.
 
 LONDON : 
 
 6AVILL, EDWARDS AND CO., PRINTERS, CHANDOS STREET, 
 
 COVENT GARDEN.
 
 
 TO 
 
 KATHARINE ELIZABETH WILLS, 
 
 Eljis ^ahxmt is Inscribb 
 
 AS A GRATEFUL TRIBUTE TO HER STERLING NOBILITY 
 OF CHARACTER, 
 
 AND AS A HEARTFELT TESTIMONY OF DEVOTED 
 AFFECTION. 
 
 ^j71 
 
 ■; / ,
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 THE IDOLATRESS 
 
 THE COURT OF DARKNESS 
 
 WESTMINSTER ABBEY 
 
 THE END OF TIME . 
 
 THE COCKCROW HEARD AT MIDNIGHT 
 
 SPRING 
 
 THE PASSING BELL 
 TO KATHARINE 
 SIR WALTER SCOTT 
 
 Page 
 1 
 
 137 
 169 
 176 
 182 
 188 
 192 
 194 
 195
 
 Jramatb ^erscitie. 
 
 King of Israel. 
 
 Stranger. 
 
 Jerada, the Idolatress. 
 
 IsDRAFiL, her brother. 
 
 Tamar, daughter of Pharaoh. 
 
 Priestess of Astaroth. 
 
 Priests, Levites, Chorus, Attendants, Spirits. 
 
 Scene — Jerusalem.
 
 THE IDOLATEESS. 
 
 PART THE FIRST. 
 SCENE— J Court before the King's House. 
 Scene I. — Kohath, Abiram. 
 
 Kohath. What of the King^ Abiram? — rumours dark 
 Are whispered o^er the land. 
 
 Ai. Nor idljj friend. 
 
 He sits like one by some blank horror bounds 
 With stony gaze on vacancy, by turns 
 Started to living utterance, as if 
 To answer the grim spirit of his dream : 
 Now chiding, now in taunting mockery 
 Complaining, self-upbraiding. 
 
 Kohath. Say, doth rumour 
 Hint aught to explain this fearful mystery? 
 
 Ab. No cause is yet divined. Some say misgivings 
 Caused by the popular discontent ; while many 
 
 B 2
 
 4 The Idolatress. 
 
 Ascribe his woe to sad remembrances 
 And stern remorse. 
 
 Kohath. Ay, there is cause enough. 
 
 Doubtless that sin returns upon his heart, 
 The wrong inflicted upon noble Tamar, 
 His first-espoused wife, whom all lament, 
 Driven by unhindness and unseemly slight 
 Whither we know not. 
 
 Ah. Alas, poor Princess ! 
 
 She is at last returned. She hath wandered 
 Far among mountain wilds and desert places, 
 Crazed by her long-accumulating sorrow 
 And outrage, suffered for her Tyrian rival, 
 The haughty heathen Princess, Jerada, 
 Who rules in Israel now, and warps our King 
 To deeds which may draw wrath on Judah's land. 
 
 Kohatli. ^Tis said she also hath become reformed 
 To IsraeVs faith. 
 
 Ah. Some such report is current. 
 
 'Tis certain she hath much conversed of late 
 With some among the Levites ; but these say 
 The task is vain. Though oft to reason yielding. 
 The force of prejudice, too strong for reason. 
 Would ever, like a flood repelled, rush back, 
 Carrying its foam of old remembrances.
 
 The Idolatress. 5 
 
 Kohath. But say, how know you of the Queen's 
 return ? 
 
 Ab. I saw her yester eve, upon the roof 
 Of her lone dwelling. 
 
 Kohath. Stood you near in sight? 
 
 Ab. I stood amidst the cedar boughs which droop 
 From the projecting cliffs above the roof. 
 
 Kohath. Say you her looks were sad ? 
 
 Ab. Past all describing : 
 
 I never yet saw features more forlorn, 
 As seen obscurely in the pensive twilight, 
 Herself more pensive and subdued, with eyes 
 Angelic, pure, and passion-free, upturned. 
 As if their spirit were in act to soar 
 Away into the starry heights. Then down 
 With sadly solemn glance, like a dark thought. 
 As if to say it must not be until 
 The darker way were trodden. 
 
 Kohath. Sir, thou'rt subtle 
 
 To read the voiceless language of the eye. 
 Spoke she no word? 
 
 Ab. Her lips did slightly move. 
 
 But distant murmurs only reached my hearing. 
 Her maidens sung ; and then at intervals. 
 Faintly and low, heart-broken breathings rose.
 
 G TJie Idolatress. 
 
 As if iu speech of woeful utterance, 
 Hair to herself, half to her maiden choir. 
 
 Kohaih, Alas, poor Princess ! I could weep for thee, 
 Were not all personal wrong as nought compared 
 With IsraeFs deeper woes. What man, my friend. 
 Can bear a breast untroubled and behold 
 Our sage King, once for wisdom^s fame renowned. 
 So fallen, at last and captive to base passion, 
 'Slaved by that wilful woman, who hath planted 
 Her foul hill-worship over Sion's heights ! 
 
 Ah. Yet not without deep sorrow ; inly galled 
 By the corroding clasp he cannot break. 
 
 Koliatli. Or rather wills not — 'tis the chain of 
 will. 
 
 Ah. He sorrows for the sin. 
 
 Kohath. Yet sinneth on. 
 
 As if two demons in one breast contend, 
 To tempt and lash the sinner with his sin. 
 
 Ah. Ay, even so it must be ; thou describest 
 The fatal marriage between Sin and Sorrow. 
 
 Kohath. They who approach his presence nearest, say 
 He sits in moody disarray, with eye 
 That bears no look of purpose. How unlike 
 The sage whose fame attracted from her sphere 
 The bright Sabean star !
 
 The Idolatress. 7 
 
 Ah. Ay, from that hour 
 
 Another spirit fell upon his heart. 
 Yes, well I mai'ked the change ; that spirit was 
 Intoxicating pride, nurse of self-will. 
 That spurns the still small voice, and clamours down 
 All wholesome caution. 
 
 Kohath. Ay, sir, so self-trust 
 
 Usurps the throne of Reason ; so poor self 
 Becomes at last sole oracle to self. 
 From that ill hour our King but apes himself 
 With wordy wisdom, the sententious echo 
 Of sense proverbial, preface oft to folly — 
 Ah me ! the sign of woe to Israel. 
 
 Ah. I fear thou speakest truly. 
 
 Kohath. Seest thou not 
 
 The Court's disorder doth disturb the People, 
 After their own rude fashion ? Labour stands, 
 Mirth moveth none, but solemn groups confer 
 In awe-struck whisperings, like the grim hush 
 Before the outburst of the tempest's might. 
 Collecting in dread silence. In our streets 
 The gathering murmurs rise, and groups collect 
 With looks of awful expectation 
 Of somewhat none can say. The shepherd leaves 
 His flock unfolded in the dews, to hear
 
 8 The Idolatress. 
 
 The tongue of muttering Treason in the streets, 
 Or rumour of misgiving. 
 
 ^h. My wise friend, 
 
 It needs no joracle in times hke this 
 To carry terrors to the thoughtful heart — 
 Enough, there''s sin in Israel, and there is 
 An Eye that sleeps not, and a Mind which never 
 Deserts its purpose, though the vain forget. 
 If for a moment God avert his face. 
 Then fools straight ask where is He. He, mean- 
 while, 
 In whose broad grasp of plan a thousand years 
 Are as a watch of the night, waits His own hour. 
 By no weak impulse hastened or delayed. 
 
 {Scene clianges. 
 
 SCENE II.— Mount Olivet. 
 
 Jerada {alone) . How may this wavering end ? His 
 frowns and smiles 
 Succeed each other like the wanton changes 
 Of sun and shadow o'er the Tyrian sea 
 Each other chasing. -^ -J^- -J^-
 
 The Idolatress. 9 
 
 If he weakly yield 
 To those grim Hebrew priests^ my deadly foes, 
 Then all I live for in this world is gone : 
 Honour — with honour, life. ^ * For.can I change 
 To save a light and spurious show of state. 
 False to the gods, my sires, and native land. 
 With faithless front to serve the statueless 
 And unsubstantial Power which is their God ? 
 Can I constrain the scorn of this proud heart 
 .To bow where I have mocked, and blindly worship 
 The objectless, impalpable Vacancy, 
 As if it were Apollo ? ^ -^ -^ 
 
 Yet I own 
 There seemeth some dread mystery of power 
 Which glooms these solemn hills, like a dread Presence, 
 Felt, though not seen — a viewless influence 
 Which even the gods would seem to know and fear. 
 Once — so the record runs — the Lord of Day 
 Stood, by this Power suspended in the South 
 For two long summer days, in shame beholding 
 The helpless slaughter of his own dear sons ; 
 While pale Astarte, o'er the dewless vale 
 Of Ajalon with answering horror gazed 
 
 Over that gory field. "^^ 
 
 7f * 
 
 * * ^ Such fearful tales
 
 10 The Idolatress. 
 
 Too speciously recorclcdj damp the faith 
 
 Needed in triads hour. 'Tis hard to trust 
 
 In gods who do not help themselves -^ "f^ * * 
 
 ^ ^ * but, still, 
 
 Shall I turn traitress to my fathers'" worship, 
 
 Whose images sit star-like o^er the dawn 
 
 Of infancy — first dreams of love and awe ? 
 
 Or can I trample nature from my breast — 
 
 My very nature — for ^twill bear that name — 
 
 Which childhood drew with life's first nutriment 
 
 From tale of nursling lore, poetic legend, 
 
 The food of earliest wonder ? Oh ! that love 
 
 Could breathe new life into the past, that so 
 
 I might be what I was in those bright years — 
 
 Heedless and happy as yon breeze-borne fly, 
 
 That wavering on the summer air, pursues 
 
 From flower to flower its trackless course of bliss. 
 * ■X- * -x- -x- 
 
 But this is sorrow's dotage, all unmeet 
 For the heroic heart, through strife and peril 
 That seeks its glorious crown. 'Tis virtue's part 
 To meet adversity's stern visiting 
 Even with a sterner front. ^ ■5«- ^ 
 * ^ ^ If our old faith 
 Be — as those Hebrews feign — all idle fiction,
 
 The Idolatress. 11 
 
 Grafted on elder truth by Gentile error. 
 
 How is this glorious world made desolate ! 
 
 If their dark creed be true — that truth were death 
 
 To earth and solemn skj, and ocean deep, 
 
 Unpeopled of their glorious spirit life ; 
 
 The flower-scented vale, the sacred hills 
 
 Where men built altars from the first of days, 
 
 Discrowned of all their sanctity ; and so 
 
 The love and faith of nations turn to lies. 
 
 And the world's record be but mockery, 
 
 The airy visions of some dreamer's brain — 
 
 It seems too vast a consequence. * ^ -^f 
 
 "^ * * Away, 
 Accursed doubts ! Away ! Great Baal ! thou — 
 Thou art no fable ; for all eyes behold thee j 
 All bosoms feel thee. Earth, the common mother, 
 Gives fruits but at thy bidding. Hill and vale, 
 Clothed in thy spectral-tinted lights, breathe up 
 Their grateful incense from a thousand realms. 
 Unnumbered hearts and eyes draw light and life 
 From thine exhaustless fountain, -x- -Je -x- 
 
 * ^ ^ Bright One ! shed 
 Some spirit from thy glorious orb within me. 
 If it be true that thou art Nature's god, 
 And not a fiction of our Gentile fancy,
 
 12 Tlie Idolatress. 
 
 Give witness of thy power i * * * 
 
 * * * I grow faint ; 
 A cloud falls on my sense. {Sits doion and sleeps.) 
 
 Enter Stranger. 
 
 Str. She sleepeth in our spell — herself a spell 
 Beyond hell's weaving, had not our dread foe 
 So framed her for our use. ^ * Power of beauty ! 
 Least earthly of man's low idolatries, 
 That gilds with love the poison fruit of sin. 
 That lures to feuds, and jealousies, and slaughters. 
 And o-lorifies the hollow front of death 
 With thy thin veil of radiance ; — winning fools 
 To leap into its dark embrace, before 
 The call of nature, for a painted skin 
 And charm, which oftenest flides away if won j 
 Fair to the eye, and bitter to the taste. 
 Most fair and fatal gift ! — stray beam of brightness 
 From the eternal throne — where they who bend. 
 Heaven's angels, scarcely are more fair than this 
 Frail sisterhood of clay, which hath been ever — 
 From their first mother, in that fatal garden, 
 Soon blighted for her beauty — our best lure 
 To wile the world to hell. * * * 
 
 * * * 1 must not lose thee,
 
 The Idolatress. 13 
 
 My fair Sidonian pearl; thou must accomplish 
 The plighted task of beauty, the entail 
 Of Eve to her sweet daughters, and secure 
 Thy babbling pedant lord, who cheats himself 
 With specious craft of words and glozing proverbs, 
 Content with forms and seemings, oft mistaken 
 For doings of the statute. "^ ■^ "^ 
 
 * * ^ Thou fair thing ! 
 I would not lose thy service for a throne. 
 Save that of Heaven ; so, for the occasion, 
 I win thee, as thy sex is won, with toys. 
 Now ho ! my airy minions — my familiars ! 
 One moment let me break your dalliance. 
 And call ye to my aid. Where'er ye loiter. 
 In grot or shadowy dale, sleeping in flower. 
 Or battling, in the breezes charioted. 
 Or, mote-like, in the sunbeams wantoning, 
 Or dancing in the broken rays that shiver 
 On the gay bubbles of the mountain brook; 
 From earth, air, water, fire, where'er ye be. 
 Your master calls — appear ! 
 
 [Voices from all round are heard in wild loio 
 harmony, seeming to grow from distance. 
 Voices. From the rocky fountains, where 
 Liquid echoes fill the air;
 
 14 The Idolatress. 
 
 From the brook whose gushing lays 
 "Wind o'er many a pebbled maze ; 
 To thy call we fleet around 
 With the witchery of sound. 
 
 From the zephyr's airy cell, 
 Rocky cleft, or wreathed shell. 
 Where the wind-god lightest slumbers. 
 Steal we sweetness for our numbers. 
 Numbers which can bind in sleep 
 Moonlight sky and crystal deep. 
 
 Lo ! we whisper — music round, 
 Bubbling deep from wells of sound. 
 Upward seems to float, and then 
 Softly sinks to earth again. 
 With a fall that thrills the heart 
 Lest the witchery depart. 
 
 Now in feathery maze we fleet. 
 And the air grows loudly sweet ; 
 While the skyey round we fling 
 Sound itself is on the wing. 
 Till mute wonder loseth all 
 In one still ethereal fall.
 
 The Idolatress. 15 
 
 8tr. It was not this I sought^ my gentle spirits. 
 
 Voices. Master, speak ! Thy slaves will pour 
 Ecstacy that floweth o^er. 
 Passion's dream, that doth begin 
 Guilty glow of waking sin ; 
 Softness, which shall steep the breast 
 In the fever of unrest. 
 
 Speak ! The spirit we will shed 
 " Leads to glory's crimson bed — 
 
 Pride of place — the haughty will 
 Which gives constancy in ill ; 
 All the dreams man calls divine, 
 Which but make him doubly thine. 
 
 8tr. Enough, enough ! Do I not know ye well ? 
 Behold yon sleeping mortal ! I would bind 
 Her spirit in the ancient faith of Tyre, 
 In which it somewhat has of late been wavering. 
 Be now your office, with soft spiriting, 
 To waken gentle dreams of days gone by. 
 From the shut cells of life-long memory 
 Recal ancestral shadows, and repair 
 The broken images of old heart-worship ; 
 The faded, touch with orient hue ; what time 
 Hath chilled, rekindle with new fire
 
 16 The Idolatress. 
 
 From passion's burning furnace ; cancel fears. 
 And fond desires, and womanly relentings ; 
 Let artful guile and smooth duplicity 
 Adorn her face and tongue, perch round her lips ; 
 And arm her spirit for our present service 
 With all your arts. But well ye know your part, 
 Andsolleaveyetoyourtask. Minecalls. (Disappears.) 
 [The Voices close round Jerada.) 
 Voices. Sleeper, sleeper, to otir charm 
 
 Let thy thoughts take hue and form. 
 
 Phantoms from the days that sleep 
 
 Buried in time's soundless deep. 
 
 Rise and waft thee back again 
 
 To the light of Syrian skies. 
 
 Where old roofs and altars rise. 
 
 Now once more, with youthful eye. 
 
 See the votive train sweep by. 
 
 With each old solemnity. 
 
 Shrine and image, grimly bright. 
 
 Mingling in with brassy light 
 
 In the gay fantastic rite. 
 
 See old Bel with tiar^d head ; 
 
 See the blood for Thammuz shed ; 
 
 And Astarte's crescent fair 
 
 Gleaming on the haunted air.
 
 The Idolatress. 17 
 
 Next, by virtue of the song. 
 
 Be thy spirit bold and strong, 
 
 And thy brain replete with art 
 
 To mislead thine own proud heart. 
 
 Lastly, if thine arts shall fail. 
 
 And the powers above prevail. 
 
 That thou may^st serve our master still. 
 
 Take thou constancy of will ; 
 
 Spirit which destruction draws 
 
 Make thee martyr to thy cause. 
 
 See, ^tis done ! Our way we take. 
 
 When we vanished be, awake. \_Foicespass. 
 
 (Jerada awakening) . How sweet heaven's music is ! 
 Live I ? Has death 
 Unmanacled my weary soul, to float 
 On sphere-born music to Assyrian skies 
 Through the still moonlight aii' ? "^ ^ Alas ! 'tis day. 
 I nothing see but sky and spotted cliff 
 And leafy chasm. * -J^- * 
 
 * ^ * Sure, ^twas not all illusion. 
 
 Methinks diviner echoes vibrate faintly 
 Along the mountain and still air, or else 
 They speak within my spirit, for I feel 
 Not merely mortal, at this moment waked 
 
 c
 
 18 Tlie Idolatress. 
 
 Into heroic nerve and constancy. 
 
 Armed for the trial which to-night may bring. 
 
 Ah-eady day declineth. OHvet 
 
 Casts its long shadow over Hinnom's vale. 
 
 While Salem's mount yet lifts in glittering light 
 
 Its broad expanse of roofs. ^ -^ -^^ 
 
 ■^ "^ * Before red Baal 
 Gilds this grey height again, my heart forebodes 
 The end of all these trials. 
 
 \8cene changes. 
 
 SCENE III.— King's House. 
 King — Chorus, 
 
 King. How daylight lingers ! Yonder glaring orb 
 Stands still, suspended on its tedious course. 
 Like some hill altar of the westward heis-ht. 
 Refusing to resign the hour of rest. 
 Would it were night ! 
 
 Gl>-0- Even at the word, behold 
 
 Yon dusky hill -top doth conceal the sun. 
 Which tarries not its stated course to run. 
 Nor hastens, whether thing of mortal mould
 
 The Idolatress. 1 9 
 
 Move slow or swiftly, or in joy or woe. 
 Untroubled by the care of things below. 
 
 King {unheeding). As if that curse, on Ebal spoken, 
 were fulfilled in me ; 
 At morn to long for night, at night for morn ; 
 Their slow-paced alternation still refusing 
 Gay cheer or grateful rest. 
 
 Cho. O ! what can mortal trust ! 
 
 See power laid prostrate, glory in the dust. 
 Dispersed the compass of all-grasping mind. 
 Alas ! how vain 
 His hope to gain 
 True peace of soul, who leaves the right behind ! 
 Him black remorse pursues, and gloomy cai'e 
 Sweeps o^er his prospect, like the desert wind. 
 Poisoning life's air. 
 
 King {unheeding). This calm is not of Nature's 
 life. I bear 
 A living death within me — a cold void, 
 A blank infinity of gloom, in which 
 All thought is lost but the black mystery 
 Of some indefinite horror, to which au<rht 
 That hearts at ease most dread, were but relief, 
 For its more life-like seeming. * * O ! that sleep 
 Might steal me for one moment from myself — 
 Sleep, or its sterner likeness ! 
 
 c 2
 
 20 The Idolatress. 
 
 Cho. The hour of cool, O King ! and grateful rest 
 On gold and amber coloiired pinion glides 
 
 As a winged angel, up the dusky west. 
 The orb of day appears not, yet abides, 
 
 Crowning with glory the dim summer crest 
 Of leafy Olivet ; the shadowy hill, 
 
 Dark'niug amid heaven's hues of fading light, 
 
 Sheds dewy fragrance from its breezy height 
 Far o'er the vales, and brooks that murmur still. 
 
 King. Such is the inward blackness of despair. 
 The lights of earthly joy in vain play round it. 
 Flouting its darkness with gay mockery ; 
 The well-known and familiar form of life 
 And spectacle of Nature, seems to breathe 
 Eeproach upon the abandoned heart; no more 
 To share the vital consciousness which binds 
 Man with the outward world. I do feel 
 Life's pleasures, sorrows, hopes, and wishes gone ! 
 
 Cho. Alas ! with this what sorrow can compare ! 
 To have all goods men seek, yet nothing share ! 
 To sit amid all blessings, yet unblest 1 
 
 King. 'Tis a fond fancy ! 
 The young heart, ignorant of evil, dreams 
 Of that which is not, and transfers its gay 
 Imaffininss to Nature, which becomes
 
 The Idolatress. 21 
 
 So gifted with a language and a life. 
 
 The lover, thus, will kiss the wild sweet flower 
 
 Which bears the fragrance of his bosom's thought ; 
 
 Or of the bright far-beaming heavens inquire 
 
 On what fair star are fixed the eyes he loves. 
 
 A sound, a picture, breath of garden air. 
 
 Some colour of the morn or evening sky. 
 
 Can wake a thousand airy images 
 
 That have no substance more than empty dreams.' 
 
 Man walks in a vain shadow, beyond which 
 
 All dark realities are met. Once past 
 
 The golden mists of youth, and love, and hope, 
 
 A vapour from the desert breathes decay. 
 
 And blights the prospect widely. Yet I blame not 
 
 The fool whose folly dreams a fleeting joy : 
 
 The dream of bliss were bliss could it endure 
 
 The chill touch of experience. Well it were 
 
 If anguish were as fleeting ! 
 
 Cko. O King ! we deem not so. 
 
 Wealth, wisdom, empire vain 
 
 While, rightly used, they flow 
 As waters o'er the plain. 
 
 With blessings as they go. 
 Yet saddest 'twere of all 
 
 If gifts of favouring Ileav'n
 
 22 The Idolatress. 
 
 Should but as vengeance fall. 
 In Heavenly goodness given. 
 Kiiiff. Power^ glory, riches, I have known them all. 
 And found all earth affords beneath the sun 
 Idle to satisfy the weary breast. 
 Sated with joys which men call happiness ; 
 Passions which burn as sunbeams on the desert. 
 To scorch and wither, but awake no life. 
 Cho. O, Friends ! if Pain 
 
 But for a moment's intermission smile. 
 If an hour's rest beguile 
 The Poor to gladness in his lowly shed. 
 If Penury its scant bread 
 Can eat in thankful trust, 
 Shall Kings complain ? 
 Shall Heaven's best gifts be vain ? 
 King. Ye do misjudge. The lowly rest content 
 In tranquil ignorance of the coming ill — 
 The secret of some future, sadly seen 
 In the far forecast of prophetic thought. 
 As he who looks from some high eminence 
 Sees tempests for the morrow gathering rise 
 Upon his visual circle wide and far. 
 While sunshine sleeps below; but most for him 
 Whom higher station lifts to wider care.
 
 The Idolatress. 23 
 
 And as the mount high raised above the plain, 
 Though glorious at its height to eyes below. 
 Is chill and cheerless there in lonely light ; 
 Such is the state of Kings ; condemned to know 
 No human fellowship of joy or grief; 
 In solitary grandeur raised above 
 The common breathings of humanity. 
 
 Cho. Call him not lone whose breadth of heart can 
 hold 
 Communion with the soul of every age, 
 The poet and the prophet and the sage, — 
 
 Whom all things which the realms of life unfold. 
 Of living frame or vegetable mould. 
 On hills that pasture, or in woodlands stray. 
 
 Call master — skilled their properties to show. 
 Compare and number, measure, class or weigh. 
 And over all, the light of system throw. 
 King. Alas ! for the laborious idleness 
 Ye to the wise impute, too often truly ; 
 If rightly he be wise or prudent called 
 Who gropes and guesses with much cost of life 
 For secrets little worth the waste when known — 
 At best uncertain — and on this fair world 
 Builds sounding systems, and o'erlooks the Will, 
 The stamp of Mind, the wisdom written there.
 
 24 The Idolatress. 
 
 Cko. Yet may we fitly praise 
 Him who is prompt to vindicate the laws 
 Of moral order, and assert the cause 
 
 Of suffering virtue, or to raise 
 His just acceptance in the social scale. 
 And by high worth prevail, 
 
 Superior 'midst the maze of worldly ways 
 
 In which the drudge of fate and fortune strays. 
 
 King. What profiteth the wear and waste of brain 
 If it convey no lasting calm, or still 
 No painful throb of the sick heart to rest, 
 Nor charm the grim devourer from his prey. 
 Or add one moment to the restless circle 
 Of life's dull iteration, which deceives 
 The dupe of present sunshine, on the road 
 His fathers trod — the tale so often told? 
 Such is the boast of that ye fondly deem 
 The moral of life's fable. 
 
 Cho. Vain, indeed. 
 
 If wisdom may discover nought but woe. 
 Or studious labour nought but folly know ; 
 If Heaven's best gifts convey no sense but care. 
 And life impart no lesson but despair ! 
 
 King. Job's comforters are ye — not much unlike 
 The reverend greybeards whose sage tediousness
 
 The Idolatress. 25 
 
 Increased the sorrows of the patriarch, 
 Adding their ill-timed taunts to his afflictions. 
 Enough, there is no balm in sophistry. 
 
 CJio. Alas ! we've seen the day 
 When thou in other mood, 
 
 King, didst count for good 
 All thou dost worthless say ; ' 
 
 Thy servants grieve to hear thee so betray 
 Thine honoured self, and nobler spirit given. 
 The gift vouchsafed from Heaven, 
 
 King [not heeding). Ay, there are moments worth 
 the rest of life. 
 Which they leave dark by sad comparison — 
 Bright flowers, whose fruit hath been consummate 
 
 sorrow 
 In their autumnal ripeness. I remember 
 Time was, when glory's phantom splendour lay 
 Upon the giddy path too long pursued ; 
 
 1 deemed man's life too short for all its gladness, 
 Its purposes of knowledge and of action. 
 
 'Twas a vain error. Now I truly learn 
 
 There's nouglit on earth so vain as mortal wishes, 
 
 And life seems lengthened far beyond its uses. 
 
 Cho. Life's uses are His purposes who gave it. 
 
 King. Ye say the truth. He who would waste the gift
 
 26 The Idolatress. 
 
 On that it was not given for, should not marvel 
 If it prove vain. But softly, — who comes hither. 
 With g-arb unwonted and portentous aspect, 
 Forbidding, haughty, strange — in whose bold eye 
 Authority seems mixed with craft — 
 Striding with proud step, as the land were his ? 
 See that he be admitted. "^ * f^ 
 
 * "^ "^ It were well 
 If aught may break on this heart- weariness. 
 
 {Enter Stranger. 
 
 SCENE IV. 
 Stranger, King, Chorus. 
 
 King. Now what art thou, who comest thus un- 
 bidden, 
 And what thine errand ? 
 
 8tr. The same errand. King, 
 
 That once led hither the Sabean Queen, 
 Won by thy far-spread fame. 
 
 King. Thy faded aspect 
 
 Doth speak far travel, and the plough of thought 
 Hath deeply traced thy features stern and wan.
 
 The Idolatress. 27 
 
 Thou, doubtless, art of some famed Gentile school 
 The founder or the tono^ue ? 
 
 Str. I have proved all 
 
 The bubbles men call science, floated down 
 The frothy stream of mortal generations. 
 By symbol, scroll, or monumental writing. 
 Or Runic scrawl on rocks of Araby — 
 The writings none may read. I, too, have watched 
 Like Hermes, on the star-communing tower, 
 And from the planetary highway sought 
 Secrets the wise pretend are written there, 
 By happy chance oft verified. 1 have pored, 
 Like other men of science, into charnels. 
 To find lifers secret, and much laughed to find 
 Death in the teacher's chair. 
 
 King. Vain words, O Stranger ! 
 
 If I may truly read thy drift, thou mockest, 
 Deriding with half-witted foolery 
 The mysteries of science. 
 
 8tr. Nay, O King, 
 
 Who hath the mysteries they vainly seek. 
 May smile a little at the groping game 
 And ponderous trifling of your bearded sages. 
 Stumbling haphazard by realities 
 In quest of dull chimeras ; idly groping
 
 28 The Idolatress. 
 
 For hidden causes, Nature's secret working's. 
 
 In tricks of language and equivocal terms. 
 
 Selected to convey some fallacy 
 
 By tacit usurpation, and impose 
 
 The shadow of a sense, which, plainly shown. 
 
 Were simply food for laughter. Or, if haply 
 
 Some casual truth be found, and, by like chance, 
 
 The gem, in error, be not thrown aside. 
 
 Or by presumptuous vanity perverted. 
 
 Then what a cloud of academic dust ! 
 
 What scrambling in the schools ! How loud 
 
 The ghosts of Babel fill the air with noise, 
 
 Exalting much Philosophy ! 
 
 King. To mock 
 
 Needs little wisdom. What hast thou to teach. 
 To other men unknown? 
 
 8tr. The craft I teach 
 
 Bestows the empire of the world on those 
 Who at my feet draw wisdom. Kings from me 
 Have learned to fix dominion or enlarge, 
 To govern progress, and secure their thrones 
 Amid the changes of the stormy stream 
 Which bears away as bubbles all things human. 
 For lack of politic counsel. 
 
 King. Vain thy craft
 
 Tlie Idolatress. 29 
 
 Of brief expedients and aims that shift 
 The present peril on the morrow's chance, 
 To stay the course of that perpetual tide 
 That bears away the statist and his schemes 
 To the dark unknown future. 
 
 S)tr- Most sage King, 
 
 Thy sayings are all worthy of thy fame. 
 I feel my heart draw wisdom from thy words. 
 And if I rightly read the policy 
 Of thy sage councils — in thy rule explained 
 By liberal institutions — they confirm 
 The maxims of my secret policy. 
 
 King. ■ Methinks 
 
 Thou riddlest darkly. Stranger. 
 
 CTio. {apart) Mark how guile 
 Worms in by flattery ! 
 The serpent wile 
 
 So charms the unwary victim from its tree. 
 
 8tr. Has not thy wisdom loosed the slavish bonds 
 Which cramp the nation's growth, and sever Judah 
 From all the world beside ? — by free allowance 
 Restoring to their just equality 
 The gods of every land — conciliating 
 The jealousy of classes. 
 
 King. Vain, O Stranger !
 
 30 Tlie Idolatress. 
 
 And by our law unsanctioned^ are such aims : 
 We know no God but one in Israel^ 
 Whose law binds all^ and is for ever fixed 
 Above the will of earthly kings or councils. 
 
 Sir. True, wisest King ! — most true. But in His 
 councils 
 A reconciling foresight still provides 
 For the far future, by His will brought on. 
 No law is fixed. His primal law is progress. 
 By the slow agency of circumstance, 
 The onward lapse of time, and accident 
 Of good or evil deeds. A feather's fall. 
 The lightest breath that blows, by man unheeded. 
 May move the train which in the ages' lapse 
 May crush a nation, or give birth to empires. 
 Such is the steady law which guides the world 
 To its maturer end. It is thy glory 
 To be monarch of this mighty era — 
 The age of promise to thy father's line ; 
 For now the Gentiles with their gods become 
 All tributary to thy central throne ; 
 And Salem, queenly in her state, sends forth 
 A sunlike influence to the ends of earth. 
 All gods bow down to thine — and are permitted 
 That thus by tolerant policy all peoples
 
 The Idolatress. 31 
 
 Shall, in the march of time, be marshalled round 
 One altar and one throne. 
 
 King. The supreme Will 
 
 Works not by chance, as thou imaginest. 
 
 8tr. That Will works also in the course of causes. 
 By one same Power ordained. Admit but this. 
 The sins for which thou fearest are His own ; 
 He moulds the hearts of earthly sovereigns 
 To acts unlimited by scroll or table. 
 All Being is His book of ordinance, 
 Most legible in kingly deeds ; inspired 
 By that same Will that guides the course of ages 
 To special ends. Thine own desires, O King ! 
 Thy very passions, are the promised wisdom 
 Which lights thy destined way. For sign, look round. 
 Thy signs are on the hills of Palestine, 
 Like stars at airy distance visible. 
 Seen, doubtless, from above. Yet unrebuked : 
 No warning voice is heard. Heaven's thunders sleep ; 
 Earth gapes not, as of old, for Dathan's host. 
 Thyself art sign portentous of the time 
 Predicted in thy sacred oracles, — 
 The Son of David, to whom all nations 
 Must one day yield subjection. 
 
 Kln(j. ' Grant it so.
 
 32 TJte Idolatress. 
 
 'Tis not for mortals to forestal His ends 
 By trampling on His laws declared of old. 
 
 Sir. Believe not God will rule this land for ever 
 By thundering- from the hills of Cana;\n. 
 His great world was not fashioned to require 
 The artist's finger to hold on its course. 
 Like some unfinished engine. 
 
 King. Wisdom strives not 
 
 With the contentious arts of sophistry. 
 Or circling shifts of sly evasion. 
 Enough — God's judgments best attest His will : 
 Thou know^st how oft with vengeance memorable 
 They with their idols were pursued ; what plagues 
 And hideous slaughters followed on the breach 
 Of the least written law and ordinance. 
 
 Sir. Such is the law of progress — ^discipline 
 Controls rude natures and subdues resistance. 
 Then kindly toleration reconciles. 
 And wins to order, and conciliates. 
 So doth the world grow on — the destined course 
 Of the first plan — the far finality 
 Of Him whose will is Nature, and who made 
 The world, and not man only. In due season 
 To be together moulded, by one man 
 Born for that end — which all things now declare.
 
 The Idolatress. 33 
 
 Clio. Thou may'st as truly shape the unwritten scroll 
 Of empire yet to be — 
 Forestallins: God's decree — 
 As guide the march of clouds on high that roll, 
 Mocking the shadows vain of earth below ; 
 The triumph or the woe, 
 The festival or strife. 
 The pomp and gilded show. 
 That fleet and pass away 
 While Fancy's shuttle plies its airy play. 
 Sir. Your strain is somewhat high-flown ; I have 
 imps 
 Can sing a song more meet for kingly ear. 
 
 King. A song !-^what mean you ? I had deem'd 
 thine art 
 The wordy warfare of the Sophist school. 
 
 8tr. Command thy servant, mighty King, the air 
 Shall utter forth a burst of vocal sweetness 
 As heaven itself has rarely known of late. 
 From spirits which obey my spell. 
 
 King. What are they? 
 
 Be not such evil ? 
 
 Str. Nay ; thy Maker, King, 
 
 Was theirs — all brethren from the same great Father, 
 Who never made aught evil.
 
 34 The Idolatress. 
 
 King. Well, they sinued. 
 
 Sir. Ay, we all sin; this, too, is of our nature : 
 These sage and courtly youths may sing or say 
 From whom we have it. lie who made the heart 
 May, doubtless, tell thee wherefore, and the end ; 
 And, knowing his own workmanship, excuse 
 Some trivial deviations : or perchance 
 The worthy end may justify the means, — 
 So say those venerable fatliers, priests 
 Of Jove in other lands. 
 
 Cho. O, friends, too well 
 
 Those words of blasph^nous irony declare 
 The secret mission, on that front of gloom 
 Already stamped, the mystery graven there 
 Upon those stony lineaments, which bear 
 The seal of doom, 
 
 The felon brand of the red vault of hell. 
 The eternal tomb. 
 Str. Your courtiers are uncourtly, King, and babble 
 Like innocent youths who have not known the world, 
 Or felt the glorious pulse of noble freedom. 
 Far higher thoughts exalt thy kingly breast 
 Than these degenerate and servile fears. 
 Unworthy of the free. The Power ye assail 
 With contumacious foolery, yet may claim
 
 Tlie Idolatress. 35 
 
 To teach ye manners in that same low home 
 Ye prate of so discreetly, gaining so 
 No mean advantas^e in the noble strife 
 With Him ye so exalt. Of this enough — 
 I speak not wisely, easting* pearls to swine, 
 The lofty speculations of the wise. 
 Unfit for slavish ear, and spirits chained 
 By ancient superstitious. King, there are 
 Deep secrets meet but for the sage's ear. 
 Wonders for wisest privacy reserved ; 
 For which I crave thy confidence, when next 
 Thy lonely thoughts invite me. Now, no more. 
 Thy thought shall be sufficient summoning. 
 
 King. Enough * ^ he's gone ! 
 
 Chorus. O King, we saw not how ! 
 
 King. 'Tis as a dream. 
 
 That form was hardly human as it stood. 
 The aspect of some blighted monarch wearing, 
 Or rather some grim leader of revolt. -^ * * 
 His words were folly — yet beguiled the ear 
 To listen tamely ; by that earthless gaze 
 Of gray lacklustre meaning fascinated. 
 Even as the gaze which eastern merchants say 
 Draws fluttering victim to the serpent's jaw, 
 Subdued by terror. His deep utterance 
 
 D 2
 
 36 The Idolatress. 
 
 Came like a spell to Lincl the prostrate will 
 
 To heed those ravings fanciful — which came 
 
 As if he had perused each inmost weakness 
 
 With curious aptness to my feeble mood. 
 
 ■5f -jf * W"ell, it is somewhat to be thus one moment 
 
 Roused up from gloomier horrors. -^ ^ •>«■ 
 
 Now to meet 
 My more seductive temptress : wished, yet feared, 
 For each new day her mood doth grow more wilful, 
 While I, alas, wax feebler. 
 
 \8cene cJianges. 
 
 SCENE V. — E-EZON a7ul Simon, meeting. 
 
 Rez. Ho ! whither now, my son ? 
 
 Si. I seek the fields. 
 
 Eez. ^Tis well. Thou'rt wanted by thy friends to- 
 night. 
 Come early forth — we meet hard by the brook 
 Of Kedron — all who hold their country dear. 
 To hear the wrongs of Israel. We shall have 
 A stirring audience, if I reckon right, 
 Full of combustible feeling. With our care.
 
 The Idolatress. 37 
 
 The spark shall not be wanting. There shall meet 
 All who have wants or grievance — coatless heroes, 
 Who know no roof but nature^s — living poorly 
 On what their hands can steal : the proper metal 
 For patriot manufacture. 
 
 Si. Who but they 
 
 So Hkely to sit free from legal bonds 
 And scrupulous restraints ? Yet, jest apart, 
 I fear we play with perilous instruments. 
 ,Some shrewder wits among the Hebrew people 
 Grow too familiar with these worn-out fancies. 
 Too oft repeated ; and there be who think 
 We make the grievances on which we clamour. 
 Troubling the Commonwealth with endless brawls 
 Of fancied grievance. 
 
 Rez. ^Tis not wise, my son, 
 
 To harp o'er much on these hypocrisies. 
 They chill the ardour of the patriot breast. 
 Ay, laugh ! — I grant it all a sorry jest 
 When scanned too nearly with misgiving eye. 
 But public virtue stands not for vain scruples 
 To gain or hold authority — enough 
 The veriest name, to consecrate the cheat; — 
 Our wiser knaves, to gild their craft, must borrow 
 Their fervour from some high-flown sentiment.
 
 38 The Idolatress. 
 
 And feig-n a virtue if they know it not. 
 
 He best dupes others who best cheats himself. 
 
 Good names mask evil deeds. If thou wouldst lead 
 
 The swinish herd to plunder and sedition, 
 
 Get up the glow of noble indignation. 
 
 Tell them what wrongs they tamely bear, and chide. 
 
 Yet praise their suffering virtue, till applause 
 
 E-ing from the thousand lying throats ; nor heed 
 
 How singly base the hearts and brainless heads : 
 
 If duped by thy shrewd art, it is enough — 
 
 The thousand hands are thine. 
 
 Si. Till now I thought 
 
 The popular champion, in high strain denouncing 
 Oppressive rulers and unequal laws 
 With all the spirit which to truth belongs. 
 His country's noblest ornament. But this 
 Sounds like a mocker's irony. 
 
 Rez. Believe — 
 
 Such is the statist^s wisdom : wilt thou be 
 The only credulous fool in this knaves' world ? 
 
 Si. Such arts, I grant, have served thy purpose 
 well. ■ 
 
 Rez. Nay, but reflect, my son — our cause is good. 
 To-night we vindicate the law — and kindle 
 A flame to purify our holy hills
 
 The Idolatress. 39 
 
 From sinfiil image-worship : so far, truly 
 We fight within the law. Our shew is justice. 
 We cannot answer who that flame may singe. 
 Look on the fair side only. Self-acknowledged, 
 All baseness cows the heart. 
 
 Si. This is, indeed, 
 
 A lesson grave from old experience. 
 
 Rez. I tell thee, boy, what forty years have taught — 
 A lesson to be learned, if thou wouldst rise 
 To lead the men of Israel. I have moved 
 The people to idolatry ; and when 
 Idolatries grew rife and fashionable 
 Among our upper ranks, with equal craft 
 And full as noble and indignant zeal, 
 V\e moved the very stones in Israel 
 To rise against them. 
 
 Si. These be doubtful changes — 
 
 What is their honest name ? 
 
 Rez. My son, there are 
 
 Two sides to every question ; upon each 
 There's truth enough for any public leader, 
 If he but keep it uppermost. 
 
 Si. I confess. 
 
 Thy doctrine hath a liberal aptitude 
 Tor any purpose, if fixed not too high.
 
 40 The Idolatress. 
 
 Rez. Still in the clouds, good Simon. 
 Si. Be it so. 
 
 But who comes moving hither, in a cloud 
 Of rainbow hues, and even at distance loading 
 The breeze with sweetness ? 
 
 Rez. Bitterness, my son. 
 
 To the true sense — thy young and fickle spirit 
 Is fascinated by the glittering pest. 
 Thy country's bane, the grievance of the day. 
 Si. A fair one, truly. 
 
 Rez. Youth, it is most foul. 
 
 (Loudly). Ho, Sorceress ! 
 
 Si. Stay, master — she will hear thee ! 
 Rez. I take no heed — what is she, that a warrior 
 Should quail before her saucy countenance ? 
 Si. I pray, be still! 
 
 Rez. My boy, I'll let her know — 
 
 Idolatress, harlot of Tyre, hilloa ! (Jer. approaching) 
 Look not so high, thou heathen Impudence — 
 Blotch, blister on the head of Israel ! 
 
 {Moves to intercept her.) 
 I have a story for thy private ear : 
 Be not so much in haste. Thou doubtless art 
 Bound to the worship of some wooden god — 
 I will not long detain thee.
 
 The Idolatress. 41 
 
 Jerada [entering). "Wretched man ! 
 
 I only shrink from thy foul tongue, the fount 
 Of all pollution. 
 
 Rez. Sweetly mouthed, fair Princess ! 
 
 Thy lips distil no balm. 
 
 Jer. Sir, I must pass. 
 
 Rez. One tender word ! 
 
 Jer. Sir, I have heard enough ; 
 
 I know thee, and thy lying craft, full well. 
 . Rez. Good ! Now, Simon, thou shalt hear my 
 
 character 
 Traced cunningly, by no unskilful tongue. 
 No unj&t model for street rhetoric. 
 Taught by the Tyrian fishwives. Come, sweet 
 
 harlot, 
 I take thee for my mirror. What am I ? 
 
 Jer. A plotter, liar, robber, and assassin. 
 Reckless of gods or men ; by daring fraud 
 Who dost obtain ascendancy o'er fools. 
 And then by tm'ns of matchless perfidy 
 Betrayest thy senseless dupes, and all who trust thee, 
 To sufier for thy treasons, thou escaping 
 By coward change of mask : each new deceit 
 So far out-lying all that went before. 
 That victims still are into trust outnoised
 
 42 The Idolatress. 
 
 By dint of falsehood inconceivable. 
 Nowj let me pass ! 
 
 ^^z. By Astaroth, well mouthed ! 
 
 Come, we are friends — congenial souls. O Jove ! 
 I fain would be thy scholar. 
 
 '^<?^*' Let me pass ! 
 
 Bez. Pass, soft one. "We do wrong- some devil. 
 Whose brazen image waits your suppliant knee. 
 Some stick or stone doth wax impatient : 
 I pray them pardon — ha ! ha ! ha ! She's gone ! 
 Ere morn we will repay her goodly lesson ; 
 She shall confess that I have store of mischiefs 
 For others than my faithful friends. Enough ! 
 The people are assembling — and remember, 
 Whatever may betide, this night we have 
 A righteous cause. 
 
 &i' I grant, a fair pretext. 
 
 Hez. Once more, my son, forego these weak dis- 
 tinctions. 
 If we can serve our end by righteous deeds. 
 Right deeds are right, although the devil do them. 
 
 \Scene cJianges.
 
 The Idolatress. 43 
 
 SCENE VI.— King, alone. 
 
 King. She tarrieth of purpose * -^ ^ even so, 
 The strife must end at last ^ "^ if strife 
 This torpor of the heart be fitly called. 
 Which wakes to pain, but feels no interest 
 In any living- joy. 
 
 It has been said 
 That paints extremity subdues the sense 
 To cease from painful feeling; — would ^twere so 
 With the self-tortures of the guilty breast. 
 By the pale phantom of accusing conscience 
 Incessantly pursued wherever it turns. 
 Turning all things to shadows of reproach. 
 Transforming pleasure's name to oracles 
 Of coming woe, or agonizing records 
 Of joys for ever flown ! 
 
 'Twere but relief 
 To outface some living terror ; that may tell 
 We are not yet on black Gehenna's shore. 
 The realm of these grim shadows, rising ever 
 Like smoke from its fell pit. * * O, for will 
 To shake this nightmare lethargy aside. 
 And stand once more myself ! unbound 
 From ties I feel not, yet cannot resist, —
 
 44 The Idolatress. 
 
 Smiles which I trust not, taunts which I resent, 
 Claims which I must deny, or yielding, face 
 The condemnation ; but no more. She comes. 
 
 (Jerada rtoshes in flushed, with looks of excitement.) 
 
 King. So, come at last. I thought thou hadst for- 
 gotten. 
 Thou hadst so long delayed. Upon thy cheek 
 There are streaked crimson tinges, and thy lips 
 Yet tremble as with hasty discomposure. 
 I prithee, smooth thy angry brow awhile ; 
 ■ It needs no sullen mood to aggravate 
 These tortures which I bear. Nay, wilt thou speak ? 
 Friendship and love ask smiles. 
 
 Jer. No doubt, no doubt. 
 
 If before kings we smile and feign content. 
 It little matters with what secret woes 
 The bosom bleedeth inly. Love there is, 
 That shrinks from the intrusion of complaint. 
 But asks the sympathy it fails to give: 
 I would not seek such love. 
 
 King. Thou tauntest wildly. 
 
 I looked for soothing from thy love : is this 
 The fitting answer? 
 
 Jer. Truly they who seek 
 
 Uncertain favour in the breast of kings
 
 The Idolatress. 45 
 
 ^Must wear the court attire of levity ; 
 
 And hide all sorrows with the mask of smiles. 
 
 Whatever offend them. I am not of these. 
 
 King. Believe, O Princess, I have full enough 
 Of bitterness to brook, without addition 
 From her for whom the deadly draught is drained 
 Even to the loathsome dregs. 
 
 Jer. Oh, not for me 
 
 Be aught of pain endured ! — there is no need. 
 Ij with my portion, by my father given. 
 May seek my native country, and live there. 
 With honour here denied. 
 
 King. Princess of Tyre ! 
 
 These tauntings are unseemly. ^Twere more just 
 To speak thy woman's wish. What want is left thee ? 
 The wealth of kingdoms but awaits thy asking — 
 The treasures of rich Ophir, Tyrian raiment. 
 Cloths stiff with gems and efflorescent gold ; 
 The spicy fragrance of Sabean woods. 
 Which tempt the phoenix to his fiery death 
 By virtue of its sweetness. If thou lackest 
 Yet costlier gifts, still, at thy word, there is 
 The Ethiop's pearl, or the bright Indian crystal 
 That holds the imprisoned sunbeam. I know not 
 What more thy heart can wish for.
 
 46 The Idolatress. 
 
 Jer. These, O King ! 
 
 May serve to purchase the scant loyalty 
 Of the rebellious and false-hearted Hebrews. 
 Such words may suit some pedlar from the East, 
 To laud his bales of costly trumpery 
 With talk magniloquent. They are not kingly. 
 Such things affect me little. The respect 
 Due to ray royal ancestry and race 
 Is stained by insult — not for me alone 
 Intended — by thy disaffected rabble. 
 Even for thy throne, ^tis time to cast off torpor. 
 And teach thy foes respect. 
 
 King. Name thine offender. 
 
 Jer. All are offenders. It were no light stain 
 To know so many sordid names. On me 
 The scowl of every Israelitish brow 
 Heaps insult, unatoned by blood ; wherever 
 I move on road or street, the grouping rabble 
 Stand glaring on me. Even within this hour. 
 As I came hither, bound in loving duty, 
 I was encountered by that felon tongue 
 That now is more than law in Israel. 
 
 King. I know of whom thou dost complain — 
 wretch 
 Who trades in popular discontents, oft finding
 
 The Idolatress. 4il 
 
 Right reasons for wrong deeds^ and making truth 
 Subservient for deception^ — right or wrong, 
 Keeping within the law he would subvert 
 By others' crime and folly. Thus protected, 
 ^Tis hard to touch him. 
 
 Jer. It were well, O King ! 
 
 If he may touch not thee. Would thou hadst seen 
 His insolent eye, and heard his ribald tongue. 
 Not without menace, as I hastened by. 
 Alone and unprotected, on my way ! 
 
 King. Thou must not heed his malice ; thou 
 shouldst be 
 Too noble to be stained by such low hate ; 
 It cannot hurt thee more than the fair moon 
 Is stained by earth-born mists. 
 
 Jer. Were it but this, 
 
 I would retort their hate with prouder scorn. 
 Throughout the countless tribes of living nature 
 There's noujjht more mean than the vile brute that 
 
 walketh 
 In man's similitude, and is not human 
 In aught that separates man from brute, but vice. 
 To me they are less than dogs ; but curs, when rabid. 
 In spite of baseness oft grow dangerous. 
 'Tis not fierce looks I fear, but evil deeds.
 
 48 Thk Idolatress. 
 
 King. O fear not thoil ! 'Tis not thy hurt they seek. 
 They only love not order, and hate rule 
 That keeps their fingers from their neighbours^ wealth; 
 And love to use their noisy privilege 
 Of railing on their betters unrestrained. 
 
 Jer. Ay, so I know them. False to gods and men. 
 Pretending reverence to the jealous God 
 Whose chosen race they dare to name themselves : 
 He, truly, might have made a wiser choice. 
 
 King. They among mankind are not worse or 
 better. 
 Chosen for the purpose of the Ruler only — 
 Not for their virtues. 
 
 Jer. I may not presume 
 
 To understand the wisdom of your law. 
 One thing is plain — if thou art King in Israel, 
 It should not be to bend to this vile race. 
 Chosen, doubtless, for their vices. What were kings 
 If those they will to honour, be fit mark 
 For public insult and contumely ? 
 What is wisdom, if the king named Wise 
 Can fail to grasp the reins of government. 
 Himself by every popular freak controlled 
 To court his enemies and desert his friends ? 
 
 King. Thou art unjust — for me, my oldest friends,
 
 The Idolatress. 49 
 
 If friends a monarcli be supposed to bave^ 
 Have all deserted : priests and counsellors 
 Look on me from afar, and sbake tbeir beads. 
 Reproving by stern silence. 
 
 ler. Wbat would tbey ? 
 
 Thy reign to Israel is the splendid era 
 Of commerce^ wealth, pacific policy : 
 Thy glory fills the eye of beaven and earth, — 
 Wbat would they have ? 
 
 King. Alas ! — too well thou knowest. 
 
 Jer. Too well, indeed! 'Tis an old craft, O 
 King, 
 To mask foul treason's front with lawful names. 
 No people better loves idolatry. 
 As your priests name all worship but their own — 
 But they hate duty, and love not control. 
 Yield but one step, the next will tread within 
 The sanctuary of State ; and when removed 
 Eacb faithful servant round thy throne, betrayed 
 By foul reports and base imaginings — 
 Then comes the dark page of a tragic tale. 
 In kingly annals trite. 
 
 King. Such well may be 
 
 True for the Gentile nations — not so here : 
 All yields to a supremer Will than man's, 
 
 B
 
 50 The Idolatress. 
 
 That rules alike men^s deeds and shapes events 
 To His fore-destined ends. 
 
 Jer. If it be so. 
 
 Then, is His will not doubtfully declared? 
 Thy God, who shapes men's ends, hath seen and 
 
 suffered 
 The worship of our lady, Astaroth, 
 Whom none who live in heaven can fail to know, 
 Conspicuous when she drives her silver car 
 Above the crystal concave ^midst the stars. 
 Your Hebrew stories tell of dreadful deeds. 
 Of wrath which tarries not, when aught offends 
 Your ruling Spirit ; yet no wrath was shown 
 LFpon that golden eve you well remember, 
 tVhen from your roof you gazed, a willing witness. 
 Upon our ancient rite. The winds lay still 
 Within their mountain hollows — not a cloud 
 Concealed us from that jealous Eye in heaven. 
 When, from our altar on that eastward height. 
 Confronting His own temple, softly rose 
 Our grateful wreath of incense to the queen 
 Whom all the Gentiles honour, and who sheds 
 Her silvery beams on all. Since then 
 The same stern Eye beholds, and still no sign 
 Is seen or heard of : He molests us never.
 
 The Idolatress. 51 
 
 Shall priest or Levite, when their God approves ? 
 Or hath his justice slept till now — that thus 
 The right unquestioned for such space, shall now 
 Be suddenly found wrong ? 
 
 King. Nay, this is vain — 
 
 Thou deem'st of God as if He were a man, 
 Acting on human motives, and beholding 
 With human vision which sees not the end. 
 Or in blind earthly rage strikes every crime 
 With mortal vengeance. Had the Lord been so 
 Impelled by blind resentments, earth had been 
 A blighted and a lifeless solitude, 
 Swept by His thunder clear from sin as that 
 Fair lifeless orb ye worship. None can say 
 Why the Lord's vengeance tarries, or how long 
 His patience may forbear ; a thousand j^ears 
 To Him are as a night-watch. This is plain, 
 His people must obey His law — in this 
 The path of safety lies ; nor leaves a doubt 
 For idle questioning. 
 
 Jer. And this, O King — 
 
 King. Forbids the altars of thy Gentile gods 
 To be permitted here in Israel. 
 
 Jer. It was not thus you spoke, when first I cumc 
 With princely dower worthy of Hiram's daughter — 
 
 E 2
 
 52 The Idolatress, 
 
 Thou then didst, as a trivial favour, give 
 That you now hold of such dire consequence. 
 But can thy God approve such flagrant breach. 
 Which violates all kingly faith ? — for surely 
 I had not so resigned my country^s gods 
 For all the thrones on earth ! Believe not so. 
 Think not so poorly of me — be assured 
 The question is of life or death. 
 
 King. Fair Princess, 
 
 There is no question of thy life. 
 
 Jer. Dost thou fancy, 
 
 O King, that I, a Royal Princess still. 
 Who ever from lifers earliest infancy 
 Have walked in honour and in reverence, ever 
 Dispensing favour and reward, can bend 
 To be a shadow in thy privacy. 
 Protected from foul outrage by contempt, 
 As some low captive, the cheap spoil of war. 
 Born for the loom and distaff, or to endure 
 The taunting triumph and malignant scoff. 
 Or sneers of courtesy mockery ? No ! no ! no ! 
 Death first ! 
 
 King. Thou dreamest, 
 
 Jer 'Tis a bitter dream ! 
 
 King. Prithee, be calm. I cannot bear to see
 
 Tlie Idolatress. 53 
 
 This passionate excess. Come, let us reason ; 
 No power may satisfy a want untold. 
 What may content thy heart ? 
 
 Jer. It needeth not. 
 
 I cannot strive against the factious hate 
 Of priest and people, lone and unprotected ; 
 Nor brave that power which kings cannot resist — 
 A lawless people and a civil faction 
 Grown mighty by endurance. Save thyself. 
 To-morrow thou wilt number one friend less. 
 And the fierce Hebrew hearts have rest from hate. 
 Yet when thou hast yielded kingly power and place 
 To the encroaching waves of the deep tide 
 That swells around thy throne with stealthy pace. 
 Thou mayst remember sadly one, to whom 
 Thou hast preferred thine enemies. {Turns to go.) 
 
 King. Yet stay 
 
 A moment more ! Though obstacles beyond 
 Aught thou canst fancy now resist thy aims 
 Once more the law must bend, as it has bent 
 To a sore need — but once may be forgiven 
 In hope of the result. Now clear thy brow. 
 Another day, I trust, thy heart will own 
 Truths clear as daylight ; — in this trust once more. 
 Take thou this signet, which shall make thy word
 
 54 TJie Idolatress. 
 
 Potential as the king's, who must be blind 
 To many things permitted ; so — no words. 
 
 [Scene changes to the front of the Temple, Jeeada 
 appears with a triumphant countenance and 
 airy gait. Her attendants are shrinking 
 from the appearance of a band of sacred 
 singers and a crowd of people assemhling at 
 the gate. 
 Jer. Ho ! ho ! I've conquered. It is ever thus. 
 Once more ! once more ! so yields the feeble spirit. 
 Imagining each new sin a step to virtue. 
 Or that they hold for virtue ; ay, once more 
 May serve for many a turn ; — 'twere well to build 
 A temple to the god of female tears ; 
 For some such god must be. But, friends, we loiter. 
 All. Princess, there's danger in the way. 
 Jer. Fear not ; 
 
 They must respect this little talisman. 
 It is an idol which they needs must honour 
 Who blaspheme all the gods. 
 
 All. The King himself 
 
 Might turn back from the scowl of those grim faces. 
 Jer. O fear not, friends ; we walk in high assurance. 
 The Queen of Heaven sustains us. We have conquered : 
 We have the King, and heed not Priest or People.
 
 The Idolatress, 55 
 
 Even my dark rival, Mempliian Tamaris, 
 
 Who would have laid our altar in the dust 
 
 Because the tiripsy Queen herself is false 
 
 To great Osiris and the gods of Nile, 
 
 The fowls and beetles which her fathers honoured. 
 
 Herself now howls, deserted ; though yon rabble 
 
 In malice to their King, not love to her 
 
 Dark face, now triply tanned, shout for her wrongs. 
 
 And trumpet her false praises. Let her keep 
 
 Her rabble state, the queen of fanatics. 
 
 We have the throne. [Ajpproacldng the Helreivs.) 
 
 Heb. Alas, my friends, 'tis hard 
 
 To bear the unrighteous falsely glorying. 
 
 Jer. What muttereth yon Hebrew chatterers ? 
 Speak ye aloud, or sing as is your calling. 
 Whichever ye deem the fittest vehicle 
 For Hebrew malice. 
 
 {The Ilehrew Minstrels sing.) 
 
 Lo ! earth profaned for vengeance cries. 
 
 And asks why Heaven is still. 
 While yonder foul idolatries 
 
 Confront her holy hill. 
 Why sleep the lightnings of high Heaven ? 
 Is Salem to dishonour given?
 
 56 The Idolatress. 
 
 Wliere once Jehovah reiffiied alone, ' 
 
 His foes securely tread ; 
 And mockery on David^s throne 
 
 Insults the righteous dead. 
 Where is the balance and the rod 
 To smite the foe of man and God ? 
 
 3er. A pretty song, and full of pious wrath. 
 Come, let us reason now, my pious youths. 
 For I am in a gracious mood this hour. 
 And fain would win such sweet-voiced proselytes. 
 Where dwells your God, whom ye exalt above 
 The moon and stars, and mountain deities. 
 Or the dread ocean ruler, or who holds 
 Dominion over mortal destinies — 
 By all the nations known ; by old tradition. 
 In poem, tale, and story canonized ; 
 The burthen of our legends old and sacred. 
 Through the whole Gentile realms and tribes. But 
 
 yours — 
 Where dwelleth he? Who e'er hath seen his face ? 
 What are his gifts ? What shower of golden rays 
 Pour from his path in heaven upon the hills ? 
 What gleams of pensive thought and soft desire 
 Silver the shadowy eve, or when the stars
 
 Tlie Idolatress. 57 
 
 Grow pale to see our virgin queen arising, 
 The worship of a hundred realms ? For she 
 Holds with her brother god divided rule, 
 Making the night rejoice, as he the day. 
 These, with their bright compeers, remoter thrones, 
 The solemn empires of the bygone world. 
 Leave not one speck of space unclaimed for him 
 Whose worshippers deny them. Whom serve ye ? 
 
 Heb. The Maker of those things, thy deities. 
 
 Jer. Where is his dwelling ? I would gladly find 
 him. 
 
 Heh. Above you, and beneath you, and around. 
 
 Jer. O ! ye worship empty space ; or, haply, else 
 A god who nowhere dwelleth ! 
 
 [Hebrew minstrels sing. 
 
 He dwells in darkness and dwells in light. 
 
 Above the firmament ; 
 The beams of day when the moon is bright. 
 The solemn shade of the starry night. 
 
 Are the curtains of His tent. 
 He walks on the tempest wing in might. 
 
 When the solid hills are rent ; 
 His spirit breathes in the blooming spring. 
 When the wilds grow sweet and the forests sing ;
 
 58 The Idolatress. 
 
 On herbless wild^ on the trackless wave. 
 
 From shore to furthest shore. 
 In the crowded street where vain mortals rave, 
 In lifers idle rout, in the silent grave 
 
 When its empty noise is o^er, 
 Where crime keeps watch in her guilty cave. 
 
 In the sacred courts where the saints adore. 
 In vain may heathen bid ns tell 
 Where the All-present doth not dwell ! 
 
 Go, take the wing of Morning — soar 
 
 From sunrise to the deep. 
 Where day's last beam departs — explore 
 Where never angel winged before, 
 
 Past Being's outer steep ; 
 Till Space be passed, and Time no more 
 
 Thy weary travel keep : 
 Swift as the light, on wing of Will, 
 Unseen He watcheth round thee still ! 
 
 A Levite. Thou hast thine answer : pass, if thou art 
 
 wise. 
 Voices in the croivch What saith the Idolatress ? 
 Levite. Speak not, but pass. [Jerada passes on. 
 \st Lev. She moves off less elate ; 'i
 
 The Idolatress. 59 
 
 '^nd Lev. Nay, mark you, sir. 
 Her proud eye quailed not, though her cheek grew 
 
 pale 
 With rage suppressed. 
 
 \st Lev. She hath a rampant humour, 
 
 By which she rules at court. 
 
 2raf7 Lev. It is reported 
 
 Her influence was formerly controlled 
 By the good Princess Tamar. 
 
 1*^ Lev. 'Tis yet strange 
 
 That brain so full of cunning can be duped 
 By senseless superstitions. 
 
 Ind Lev. 'Tis most common ; 
 
 Such is the true condition of our thoughts 
 To hold opinion, and know not how. 
 It is a common error which refers 
 To human reason for the faith of men. 
 For fiction or reality. Men know. 
 Or hold belief by habit and the schooling 
 Of early years, or sanction of experience ; 
 Contracting faith and confidence from custom. 
 And the world^s use. 
 
 \8t Lev. It is of late reported 
 
 That she is secretly a proselyte. 
 
 Ind Lev. 'Tis known
 
 60 Tlte Idolatress. 
 
 That she liath had much late discourse 
 With an old priest of Tyre — since circumcised 
 A proselyte to the law. But without end ; 
 For still, ^tis added, that proud will of hers 
 Doth overbear all reason — still persisting 
 In obstinate fidelity and zeal 
 For dim traditions of her native earth, 
 And old ancestral gods. 
 
 \st Lev. Delusion strange ! 
 
 \8cene changes. 
 
 PART THE SECOND. 
 SCENE I. — Jerada, Isdeafil. 
 
 Jer, My brother, I reproach thee not : yet blame 
 Thy overzeal and unclaimed courtesy 
 To my swart Memphian rival, whom these Hebrews 
 Miscal the Queen ; I know not why, save that 
 She is a veering proselyte, and adores 
 Their cold and statueless Divinity. 
 
 Isd. Give but a moment's patience. Not long 
 since 
 I met her with her maiden train, at eve — 
 Wandering, as is her wont, through pensive twilight.
 
 The Idolatress. 61 
 
 In plaintive guise, with step forlorn and sad — 
 Moving like the pale moon amidst the stars. 
 In silent majesty. 
 
 Jer. Thy tongue is wanton. 
 
 TMiat said she to repay thy idle gaze ? 
 
 Isd. Nothing to me. At intervals methought 
 Her plaintive and heart-broken murmurs rose 
 Into low words of mournful purport. 
 Half to her maids^ addrest, more to herself. 
 
 Jer. Too much of this — thou reachest no end of 
 folly. 
 
 Isd. Untouched by sadness which to see I wept. 
 My young companions mocked; for which I chid 
 them. . 
 
 Jer. No doubt. What followed next? 
 
 Isd. Nought but a smile 
 
 Of bright resigned sadness, that yet bore 
 A stately beam of queenlike courtesy, 
 "Which, gladdening, humbled too. 
 
 Jer. O, humbling gladness ! 
 
 Thou didst but shame thy wiser comrades, boy, 
 Nor honoured much thyself: they better marked 
 The malice of the grim Egyptian smile. 
 
 Isd. They read not the soft eye which looked on me 
 Just for one instant, and then upward turned,
 
 t)2 The Idolatress. 
 
 With look of patience mixed with pious trust, 
 So full of lowly love aud resignation, 
 That it was hard to witness, and not worship 
 The Spirit she so prayed to. 
 
 Jer. Even thus low 
 
 Thy courteous knee hath bent ; or else they wrong 
 thee. 
 
 Isd. Sister, it is no time, were they even worthy — 
 To meet these brawling slanders. Even now 
 I hear, not for, upwinding from below. 
 With Kedron's waters mingling, choral notes, 
 Which sound like strains of triumph half in fear. 
 Glad notes in sorrow uttered. 
 
 Jer, Even so. 
 
 The praises of the high and glorious gods. 
 Sung by weak mortals in adversity. 
 And in dishonour. 'Twas not thus of old, 
 With spirit so degraded, we were wont 
 To steal, with culprit eye and felon pace, 
 Amid the sleep of prying Israel, 
 To our hill worship. Then ere gentle eve 
 Went down the west, and gradual night stole on, 
 Hushed with sweet expectation, Astaroth ! 
 How boldly from that silence burst our song ! 
 Rivers of sound from countless multitudes.
 
 The Idolatress. 63 
 
 "Waking glad answer from our hills, and filling 
 
 The soft Assyrian sky. But go; I'll wait their 
 
 coming 
 A little onward, in yon leafy height. 
 Thy watch is set beneath. [Exit Isdrapil.) 
 
 \A wild cojiseioood on a loio elevation at the 
 base of Mount Olivet. Jerada enters 
 alone. 
 Jer. So far all seems to prosper. Yet, whence 
 comes 
 This dark misgiving, like the boding shadow 
 Cast by some coming ill ? I should be now 
 Rejoicing '^ * Somewhat presses on my heart. 
 I feel as one committed to his doom, 
 Or who stands pledged to mortal enterprise 
 That binds the plighted champion to advance. 
 After the boast of bravery is gone by 
 And clamour of the admiring crowd, at last 
 Alone with danger. "^ * {pauses.) 
 
 * * What know I of Baal? 
 I never yet saw aught of any god — 
 
 (A strange Youth emerges from the copse.) 
 
 What art thou ? 
 My country's native, by thy Tyrian garb 
 And lineament not less.
 
 64 The Idolatress. 
 
 Sir. Princess of Tyre ! 
 
 The gods have marked thee for their own — hereafter 
 To live and reign among them. 
 
 Jer. Who art thou ? 
 
 Str. That shalt thou timely understand ; but first 
 Bravely fulfil thy honourable task 
 So well begun, and win thy glorious name. 
 To be hereafter praised in song. Thy country 
 Shall ring with praises of thy deed to-night. 
 
 Jer. And next, what shall the end of this night be ? 
 
 Str. ^Tis veiled in a bright mist from mortal eye. 
 It will be glorious. Thou go on, and conquer. 
 Thy life's bright crown awaits thee. 
 
 Jer. When, and where ? 
 
 Sir. Ask not. Ere Baal gild this orb at morn 
 Thou shalt know much to mortal mind unknown ; 
 Turn not and look not back. This night shall tell 
 What thou must be — and where ! Behold thy 
 
 friends. 
 Who wait thy leading ! We shall meet ere morn. 
 
 Jer. He's gone — even as he came — or do I wake? — 
 He looked more fiend than ^od. His cruel eve 
 Did seem to mock his smooth tongue's utterance : 
 His speeches were of sense ambiguous. 
 Like sentence of some oracle that urges.
 
 Tlie Idolatress. 65 
 
 The victim of some fatal destiny. Alas ! 
 
 My heart beats audibly. I would ^twere over ! 
 
 But they are nigh. 
 
 \Choral voices become loud, and the 
 Heathen train approaches. 
 
 {To the Priestess.) At last, good mother ! 
 I fear tbou art weary. 
 
 Priestess. Noble Princess, no ; 
 
 I have feasted in thy triumph ; but still take 
 My long-forgotten office fearfully, 
 And with a trembling joy. Are we secure ? 
 Has the grim Hebrew despot no reserve, 
 To cheat our hope, and lure us to our fate. 
 To popular rage betrayed ? 
 
 Jer. This were too crafty 
 
 For the soft pedant monarch, only cunning 
 In sentences and proverbs trite. His power 
 Rests in this hand [shotvs the si()net'\ : the State of Israel 
 Lies here to-night. Our chain of royal guards. 
 All mighty men of war, are posted round, 
 Holding each mountain pass, that no approach 
 May break upon our rites. 
 
 Priestess. Alas ! my daughter. 
 
 What guard shall watch the guarders? — godless He- 
 brews ! 
 
 p
 
 66 The Idolatress. 
 
 But armed, and therefore to be far more feared ; 
 Wolves trained to murder; — and there runs a rumour. 
 That met us, down yon hollow, on our way. 
 Of many thousand ruffian populace 
 Fast gathering at the grim Betrayer's call, 
 To perpetrate some foul atrocity, 
 Beckless of laws and king alike — -x- -k- -x- 
 
 Methought 
 I heard a swarming murmur down the vale. 
 Its fearful portent breathing — in dark distance, 
 The voice of fear and slaughter. "Who may stand 
 Between us and their fury ? 
 
 Jer, Queen Astarte, 
 
 And all -protecting Baal, and every god 
 Who watches o^er our sacred rites. 
 
 Pr. But now 
 
 ^Twere well to cease from inauspicious words : 
 Our Tyrian youths come on with better omen, 
 The praises of the high and glorious gods ; 
 She first, whose silver car begins to light 
 The eastward mists. How few, alas ! we are. 
 Stealing with tremulous port and felon pace 
 To our hill worship. 
 
 Jer. Yes, I remember 
 
 Those happy days — long past — for I was then 
 A heedless child, by sufferance looking forth
 
 The Idolatress. 67 
 
 From some liio-li lattice on the sacred fires, 
 With airy brightness lessening from far heights. 
 Like stars of heaven that start successively 
 O'er the dark vault of night — fire after fire, 
 From hill to distant hill, with joyous tiding, 
 Rejoicing men and gods. How many voices 
 Went up together from all the land. 
 The chorus of a people ! 
 
 Pr. Princess, these 
 
 Are sad, yet hallowed, recollections. 
 Shall these old eyes behold such days again ? 
 Hush ! the anthem. 
 
 [Enter the Sidonian train, singing ; some hearing 
 vessels, images, and symbols of Astarte. 
 
 SCENE 11.—^ Valley near the City. A Crowd of 
 
 the People. 
 Rezon, Simon, a Levitb. 
 
 Simon. Such things, 'tis, said, have been. 
 
 Old Man. Yes, master, yes ; 
 
 "When Judges ruled the land, I well remember 
 My grandsire, an old warrior, used tell 
 Of armies in the clouds, and apparitions 
 Of idols grim and spectral demons, seen 
 Oft between night and morning.
 
 68 The Idolatress. 
 
 Simon. Even yet, 
 
 But four nights since, wandering by this same 
 
 brook. 
 In lonesome thought, there came a far wild wailing. 
 Upon the night air swelling fitfully, 
 As from th' asphaltic pool, where yet, 'tis said. 
 The ghosts of Sodom haunt the gloomy shore. 
 
 Rez. Ay, friends, even so it is — traditions old 
 Bear witness to these hearingrs. Such sis^ns are 
 The bodings of disaster, and foreshow 
 Heaven's judgment upon rulers. 
 
 Lev. And, if so, 
 
 Not less, perchance, on people. 
 
 Rez. Ay, all sin ; 
 
 But chiefly they who cause the land to suffer. 
 The people suffer for the ruler's sin — 
 Sold to the devil-worshippers of Tyre, 
 Thro' whom a Gentile god usurpeth place 
 Before the Temple. In nought we err 
 But our idolatrous submission. 
 In bearing that which Heaven abhors, and earth 
 Is weary of. Well might the sacred stones 
 Once trodden by your honoured fathers, start 
 To avenge tneir memories ; and compel 
 Just retribution for their children's wrongs ;
 
 TJie Idolatress. 69 
 
 Ground down, for Gentile priests and their vile mistress. 
 
 The Tyrian harlot ; and build impious altars 
 
 To Baal and Moloch, and th' accursed one 
 
 They name the queen of heaven. Are ye prepared, — 
 
 Children of Abraham, will ye submit 
 
 To throw aside the Tables of the Law ? 
 
 Deny the Spirit which sits within the Ark, 
 
 And choose, for Sion's people, from abroad 
 
 A ruler and a god ? — or dare, at last. 
 
 To rise, and nobly vindicate the right ? 
 
 Choose now whom ye will follow ! 
 
 Peo. Only thee ! 
 
 The people's friend ! — no other ! 
 
 Rez. Gentle Simon, 
 
 Thou hast a ditty suited to the time. 
 
 Peo. The song ! the song ! [Simon sings. 
 
 Yon star, the light of shepherds' eyes 
 
 That watch the dewy fold. 
 Its cheering beam of late denies, 
 
 So wan and deathly cold ; 
 All hearts are sunk in deepest gloom 
 
 And sadness ; none can tell 
 What evil spirit doth consume 
 
 The heart of Israel !
 
 70 The Idolatress. 
 
 O for the strain of power ! — the hand. 
 
 From whose charmed touch, 'tis said. 
 The sounding silver while it spanned. 
 
 The fiend of darkness fled ! 
 O for that chord, that hallowed lay. 
 
 To break the unholy spell, 
 The voice inspired, to drive away 
 This woe from Israel ! 
 
 \A8 the song ends, a tow strain of distant music 
 floats upon the air. 
 Rez. Ho ! heard ye there ? No holy strain, my 
 friends. 
 Though coming from the abode of Judah's ruler, 
 Whose politic wisdom would appease the priests 
 And followers of Baal. 
 
 A Peasant. Noble master. 
 
 It comes not from the city. \_S train heard again. 
 
 Sim. List again ! 
 
 A Peasant. Down from the sky it seems to fall. 
 Another. Be still ! 
 
 Sim. It falls like starlight from the heavenly vault. 
 Rez. Ye are mistaken all. I trace the voice 
 To its accursed source, on yonder hill-top. 
 Good master minstrel, thou should'st have more 
 cunning
 
 TJie Idolatress. 71 
 
 In thy own craft. Such was the strain I heard, 
 Nigh Kabbah in the plains, on such a night. 
 Even at this very hour, when not far off 
 The Ammonite with the Assyrian host 
 Lay camped, and, save the slow-paced sentinel 
 Of the mid-watch, the land was still around. 
 Then came that discord from a low-browed hill. 
 Where the idolaters disturbed the night 
 With howling orgies of their devil-worship, 
 Baying the moon like dogs. O ! little then 
 I thought to hear such impious music echo 
 Over the Mount of God, and calmly heard 
 By father Abraham's children, as it were 
 A pleasant.song ! O but I blame ye not ! 
 Your manhood is crushed out by the hard gripe 
 Of the exacting Publican. ■'Twere unmeet 
 That people so dishonourably farmed 
 To swell the Tyrian harlot's scornful state. 
 And feed her obscene altars, should presume 
 To tread the footsteps of their glorious fathers. 
 Or fiffht the battles of the God of Hosts. 
 
 [The jyeople murmur^ 
 Well, ye are moved. Full glad am I to see 
 Ye feel the force of shameful imputation. 
 And nobly scorn the charge of cowardice.
 
 72 The Idolatress. 
 
 The weak love not reproach — the manly spirit 
 
 Repels disgrace by honourable deeds. 
 
 Sons of the mighty ! before whom their fathers 
 
 Oft fled the field on many a glorious day, 
 
 Rise I — break the bond your foe is weaving round you, 
 
 To bind you in your sleep with heathen cords, 
 
 Like Sampson on that harlot^s lap of old. 
 
 Not baser than this curst one — she of Tyre. 
 
 Rise ! break your bonds ! This night the field is 
 
 yours ; 
 To-morrow, theirs. An hour, and ye are slaves. 
 The Syrian holds your hills. Shajl we not strike. 
 For freedom and for vengeance ? 
 
 People. Vengeance — vengeance ! 
 
 Ab. To Olivet !— follow. 
 
 [The crowd rush after Rezon ; Levitb 
 remains. 
 
 Lev, The deed maybe the Lord's — the crime is his. 
 By such base agents doth the adversary 
 Tempt whom he is permitted to destroy. 
 Or by calamity amend. This counsel 
 Were good if honestly designed and sanctioned 
 By true authority and lawful means ; 
 But much I fear, when false and lawless men 
 Set up for champions of the people's cause.
 
 The Idolatress. 73 
 
 When the Supreme Disposer of events 
 Decrees to exalt or save a state, His shown 
 By the consent of honourable men 
 Who hold in place, repute, authority. 
 The sure credentials of their sacred calling:. 
 God's servants work not with the deviFs arms, 
 Fraud, falsehood, breaches of the moral law. 
 Alas ! they err who hope redress, from crime — 
 And, more — who trust that traitors can be true, 
 When their black ends are won. ^ * * 
 
 * * * But let me not 
 Be an ill prophet. Curst may be the hand 
 That strikes the blow. The Lord is on His throne, 
 To witness with all-seeing eye, and guide 
 With overruling arm, to His own end. 
 Him all the unseen working elements. 
 Moral and social, secretly obey. 
 The statist's error, or the people's folly. 
 The agitator's craft, the despot's will, 
 The madness of the moment or the age, 
 Are but the mingling threads of the broad tissue 
 Wove by one Hand, on one imperial plan. 
 Too broad for mortal vision. In this hope 
 The good man trusts, in these uncertain times. 
 
 [Scene changes.
 
 74 The Idolatress. 
 
 SCENE 111.— King's House. 
 King, Zadoc. 
 
 King. Yes, leave me, servant of the Holiest, 
 As He has left me. All have left me lone — 
 The counsellors and friends of early life. 
 And so it should be. I have ceased to be 
 That which I have been : I no longer know 
 Sorrow or gladness, human hope or fear. 
 Or aught of life, save the dull blank of living 
 In this vile dungeon of a frame : 
 The light of day, or silent hour of night 
 Return to me with sad monotony, 
 And life is but a long-drawn weariness 
 That sits upon the bosom as the spectre 
 Which haunts the fevered sleeper. 
 
 Zadoc. This, O King, 
 
 Is the sick heart's diseased imagining. 
 And needs the Great Physician. He alone 
 Can heal the broken spirit. Gird thy breast 
 "With resolution, only once to breathe 
 One pious wish for aid. 
 
 King. I cannot wish ! 
 
 Bid me take eagle's wing, and scale the heaven.
 
 Tlie Idolatress. 75 
 
 It were as easy. Wish ! this were to break 
 Human will. 
 
 Zadoc. Thy Lord will surely break that bond, if 
 thou 
 Use His appointed means — in which lies 
 The only strength on earth to mortal given. 
 'Tis but to seek it. Heaven is scaled by prayer 
 More swiftly and more sure than eagle's wing 
 Can sunward mount. 
 
 Khig. Thiuk'st thou the murmur false 
 
 Of heart-belying lips, such as men use 
 To mock with, in life's hollow courtesies, 
 "Will pass with Him who may not be deceived ? 
 Fu'st, bid the sinful mortal quit himself; 
 Put on a nature as a change of dress. 
 Or steal from heaven a beam of its clear day 
 Wherewith to light his darkness. 
 
 Zadoc. This, God only 
 
 Can do for mortals ; but in this all men 
 Are equally dependent. He but asks 
 What He hath given : the imperfect will 
 He doth accept and strengthen ; the dull wish 
 He with his Spirit quickens ; He to prayer 
 Imparts its vital power and fervency. 
 From light to hght, from faith to firmer faith,
 
 76 Tlie Idolatress. 
 
 He lifts the spirit toward the gate of heaven. 
 And with His breath of healing life renews 
 The striving, Spirit-seeking soul. 
 
 King. Old man. 
 
 Thy words to me are idle. I have wandered 
 Even in the noon-day light, and may not hope 
 To walk in triple darkness aught more truly 
 Than in the day. There is no help for him. 
 The wretched man abandoned by the Lord ! 
 
 Zadoc. The Lord abandons no man. He hath 
 power 
 And mercy, though thy sins as scarlet were. 
 To wash them whiter than the driven snow 
 On Ararat's high peak. But thou, O king. 
 Err not against thy knowledge. Thou well know'st 
 It is not given at once to honour Baal 
 And mock with prayer the God ot Israel. 
 ■"Tis vain for man to take the downward road. 
 Then murmur if it leads not up to heaven. 
 Choose between God and Baal. 
 
 King [impatient^ Now, enough ! 
 
 Thou canst not fancy that thy trite allusions 
 Rouse aught but irritation, and exhaust 
 The frail endurance of a shattered brain. 
 Nay, my old friend, I mean thee no affront ;
 
 Tlie Idolatress. 77 
 
 But words are needless : thou hast done thy part 
 Bravely and well, as best beseems thine office, 
 And so we part. {Retires.) 
 
 Zadoc {alone.) Ah, me ! what are the wise 
 
 But subtler fools, whose folly lies more deep, 
 O'erlaid by this world^s specious fallacies ! 
 False goods, false maxims, and unmeaning terms ; 
 A glittering tissue, frail as gossamer. 
 Yet hardly pervious to a ray of truth. 
 Man needs more mercy than he may conceive ; 
 For his best virtue needs much pardon still. 
 Alas for this sad hour ! But soon shall I 
 Find refuge with my fiithers, and escape 
 The woes that threaten this unhappy land. 
 
 \_Scene changes. 
 
 SCENE IV. — Night. A Chamher in the King's House. 
 The King alone. 
 
 King. At last I am alone, and sadly free — for best 
 The heart may deal with its own bitterness. 
 And prove the refuge, which kings find not oft, 
 From counsel vain, — obtrusion of rebuke,
 
 78 Hie Idolatress. 
 
 The oLliqae taunts that masks itself iu semblance 
 
 Of duty or of love ; the galling folly 
 
 Of simple-hearted honesty, which talketh 
 
 Of sin as if it were impossible, 
 
 And holiness as if it were the garment 
 
 Of this unrighteous world, and not its mask. 
 
 I daily madden from this hornet swarm, 
 
 That will not leave me rest ; for all, save rest. 
 
 The sunless, deep suspense of heart and brain. 
 
 Is but a foretaste of Gehenna^s fire. 
 
 for one hour's escape ! — I would now give 
 This kingship for one hour's forgetfulness. 
 Though but the next were death — too happy death. 
 Could it but quench this fiery essence, life, 
 
 That burning on for ever may endure 
 Beyond the pangs of flesh. Each way in vain 
 
 1 turn to seek a truce with thought, and fly 
 From my dark self — the inseparable horror 
 I bear about me -^ -^ * 
 
 That presses on my spirit * * -^ 
 
 * ^ -x- J ijjjyg turned 
 
 From the endurance of my lonesome thoughts. 
 Which are as haunting demons, to confront 
 The eyes and tongues of men ; from these again 
 Back to the weary burden of my own
 
 The Idolatress. 79 
 
 Black, self-tormenting fancy. * ^ ^ 
 
 * * ^ Still there is 
 A momentary ease in close encounter 
 With other's folly ; and, a moment, feel 
 Some gleam, thoug-h faint and feeble, of myself. 
 Now — were it hut an hour's relief — once more 
 To hold dispute with that contentious Sceptic, 
 Whose crafty drift I well may penetrate. 
 And find some play in baffling. Strange it is 
 How fools, who name themselves philosophers. 
 Outstep their science ever ; and contemplating 
 The measured combinations and results 
 Of visible nature — should be blinded so. 
 To that they all so plainly indicate, 
 The ruling Purpose and creative Hand : 
 Pronouncing the unknown, impossible ; 
 For mystery, inventing explanation 
 That leaves the darkness darker. This is vain. 
 Now to recal the sage Chaldean Seer, 
 I would try all things — were he now at call. 
 It were some intermission to these dark 
 And wearing meditations. Ho, again ! 
 Again uncalled — {Stranger enters.) 
 
 A stranjrc coincidence ! 
 Sir. I come. for on my spirit sits a spell
 
 80 Tlie Idolatress. 
 
 "Which biuds me to thy royal willj and tells 
 The thoughts which wear with unavailing strife 
 Thy spirit striving with the bond of Fate, 
 Which chains alike the foolish and the wise, 
 The feeble and the strong. Thy course is written : 
 They only rest who strive not. Banish thought 
 And idle musing : Fate will guide thee on. 
 
 King. I think not, Stranger ; I am sick of thought. 
 And life with all its uses, and were glad 
 To part from weary consciousness of self, — 
 Vain questions and misgivings. 
 
 &tr. Wisest King, 
 
 Trust me this is but sickness of the body, 
 Some foul congestion, which offends the brain. 
 Whose cause and cure within the stomach lies, 
 True seat of all that mortal dignifies 
 With lofty names of Reason, Will, Affection, 
 To exalt his being o'er his brother brute, 
 More wise in following Nature's gentle law : 
 All care is sickness, otherwise miscalled. 
 And curable where it begins ; by drug 
 Or grateful wine, or sleep — not heeding 
 The sophist's idle art. Thy need but asks 
 Somewhat to stir the languid blood, and warm 
 Thy stagnant vital juices.
 
 The Idolatress. 81 
 
 Kinff. It may be : 
 
 I am not equal to this wordy war. 
 Thy words seem echoed by kind Nature's voice, 
 
 Str. Yield thou to Nature — ^'tis necessity, 
 Spoken by heart and nerve, and blood and brain, 
 For He thou namest thy Maker so decrees : 
 Thy nature is His will, graved in thy flesh ; 
 His law, as much as any in thy Tables, 
 Graved on stone only — only law in Jewry. 
 
 Khig. I pray, blaspheme not. 
 
 Str. Let it pass ; but think 
 
 Vain self-infliction is no part of wisdom. 
 Of which the reasonable end is good. 
 What was man made for else ? with soft desires 
 And aptitudes for pleasure, fine endowments. 
 And happiest apprehensions of delight. 
 And senses apt, for which the outer world 
 Is fitly framed and stored with all things needful 
 For each fine sense. Look round on every scene. 
 And say where sorrow and self-torment dwell 
 In living Nature's round. What shame it were 
 If he whose wisdom is the sage's lamp 
 Should sit alone within the prison-cell 
 Of a sick bosom's self-created love, 
 Steeped in dark dreams, while sunsliine falls around, 
 
 G
 
 82 Tlie Idolatress. 
 
 Scared by black phantoms, while all around is li^bt, 
 And peace, and joy, and beauty ! 
 
 King. Friend, I fear 
 
 There is no healing: in the din of words. 
 The bosom pressed with its own consciousness, 
 Shrinks from the sad comparison that tells 
 All it has forfeited : the dungeon^s gloom 
 Is doubly darkened by sad memory 
 Even of the common light of day without. 
 
 Str. How sad a counsellor is weariness. 
 Presenting thus the shadowy side of truth, 
 If it be truth, so seen ! Now pass we words 
 And thinking heals no sorrow. We for this 
 Must use the appointed medicine — mirth and music, 
 And renovating food, and wine created 
 To lift the sinking soul from heaviness ; — 
 Let these revive thy spirit ; wisdom then 
 Will speak her own true language. 
 
 King. Truly, friend, 
 
 These common means ask no Chaldean art. 
 
 &tr. The sage's art, O king, is known in using 
 Things common to uncommon purposes. 
 That add to mankind's sum of happiness, 
 Creation's aim, the end of all true wisdom : 
 The majesty of truth is in its use.
 
 The Idolatress. 83 
 
 The sage is minstrel, chymist, conjuror ; 
 Can cure diseases, fabricate attire, 
 Compound new tastes or theories, or set 
 New creeds or dishes jroing:. 
 
 King. All such arts 
 
 Are doubtless needful, but below the sage. 
 
 8tr, Not as the sage can use them ; give but 
 leave. 
 And thou shalt hear what may awake some wonder. 
 \IIe loaves his arm, and the chamber is Jilted 
 tvith sweet low voices. 
 
 Voices. The sphere moves on its calm 
 
 And silent axle round ; 
 The heavens are breathing balm. 
 
 In quiet earth is bound. 
 And dewy slumber creeps 
 
 O'er every living thing ; 
 But wakeful sadness keeps 
 
 The heart of Salem's Kin<r. 
 
 Night — stars of heaven, infuse 
 Your calm and hallowed gleams ; 
 
 Sleep, come with healing dews. 
 And soft ecstatic dreams. 
 
 G 2
 
 84 The Idolatress. 
 
 Meek Genius of the west, 
 
 That steals on silent wing, 
 Come hither — lull to rest 
 
 The heart of Salem^s King ! 
 
 King. I am amazed — 
 
 I have seen much of magic's juggling craft, 
 The powers and cheats of muttering sorcerj, 
 And proved the wonders of alchemic lore ; 
 But ne'er till now beheld a trick of art 
 With such slio^ht form of outward circumstance. 
 I comprehend thy smile : thine art, thou'lt say. 
 Is not the trick of Eastern sorcery. 
 Well, grant it not ; your spirits strangely err, 
 Calling on lifeless things, unconscious 
 Of sense or hearing. 
 
 8tr. Question — they shall hear thee. 
 
 King. Mysterious singers — tell me what ye are. 
 Who call thus sweetly on inanimate things. 
 Mute Nature hath not ears — the stars hear not ; 
 Why call ye so on objects without life — 
 Night, stars of heaven, the winds ? If ye be not 
 Tourselves of spirit kind, no spirits hear 
 Save One — too dread for such imaginings ! 
 Night, with its starry gloom, and grateful dews,
 
 The Idolatress. 85 
 
 And fresli'ning airs, and holy lonesomeness, 
 And solemn bird, and far low-murmuring streams. 
 Are ever dear to song-, and sweet to sense ; 
 But have no spirit in them, unless that 
 The mind's own vagrant sympathy bestows 
 On their unconscious beauty. What say ye ? 
 
 Voices. In the forest hast thou strayed. 
 At autumn- evening's fall. 
 And hath thy wandering footstep stayed, 
 And thine eye recoiled from the haunted shade, 
 
 At the spirits' whispered call ? 
 Hast thou felt a chill in that cold dim light, 
 
 At some shadow pale and grey. 
 That formless glides through the silent night ? 
 Or if spectral forms thy dream affright. 
 Wise mortal, what be they ? 
 Say, whence the thrill of mystic dread? 
 Can warrior fear things still and dead ? 
 
 '&^ 
 
 Thou ownest the secret moving power 
 
 Of terror, beauty, grace : 
 When Nature woos with breeze and flower. 
 When vales are bright and mountains tower. 
 
 The Genius of the place 
 Speaks, voiceless, to thy heart.
 
 86 The Idolatress. 
 
 'Tis Nature's spirit language, far 
 Beyond the seer^s or poet's art, 
 When fancies wild on fancies start, 
 
 Our utterings they are. 
 
 King. If so, then ye 
 
 Are but illusions — fantasies reflected 
 From the soul's self, and creatures of the mind 
 In its fantastic moods. 
 
 Str. O wisest King, 
 
 Thou art too subtle for these airy triflers, 
 Who dally with thy weariness. Apply 
 The truth thou speakest. What are griefs and joys 
 But the mind's moods reflected on itself? 
 External brightness is but inward ease ; 
 Care casts its shadow on the noonday sun : 
 Be joyous, and the noon of night will laugh ; — 
 Thus read the moral of the song. 
 
 King. In truth 
 
 Their music much excels thy sophistry; 
 For either cheat there were small need, if sorrow 
 Could be at will transmuted into joy. 
 
 Str. It may be conquered, which were worthier ; 
 But for all useful ends the wise find means. 
 Behold the grand specific ! — wine is strength.
 
 The Idolatress. 87 
 
 The fount of wisdom and true fortitude, 
 
 {Fills a crystal cup and holds it to the light.) 
 That cast aside slow doubt. Pure golden tide ! 
 In which meek evening's modest beam exults, 
 And dancing revels in thy wave of bliss ; 
 Thou hast a life within thee, swift to glide 
 Through the dull mazes of the saddest heart. 
 Driving away all sorrow. Thy rich fume 
 Spreads its high fragrance to this lofty roof. 
 Come, test its healing virtue. 
 
 {Holds the cup to the King, %oho seems to hesitate^ 
 
 Nay, fear not. 
 But freely drink. ^Tis wholesome wine of Shiraz — 
 Good Persian, by its sparkle. ^ -^ -^ 
 
 * * "^ There ; well done. 
 The noble cordial bravely doth its work. 
 I see the rush of new-born life distilling 
 A regal crimson o'er thy face and brow. 
 Now dost thou look as the sage King, of whom 
 The Orient rings so loudly. Now I see 
 The fair Sabean majesty's desire. 
 
 King. !Most sage old seer, thy medicine exalts 
 The sense of wisdom and the vital power. 
 And brightens all the faculties beyond 
 The power of Egypt's musty conjurings.
 
 88 TIlc Idolatress. 
 
 Sir. Said I not truly ? 
 
 King. True, illustrious magian. 
 
 I feel the vital essence circulate 
 Fresh gladness through life's issues ; and begin 
 To feel how vain the weary waste of thought ; 
 How looking back on gone-by things is idle. 
 
 Sir, More truth was never spoken ; but drink on. 
 Improve the inspiring lesson. 
 
 King. What was that 
 
 Bright liquor which methiiiks I saw thee drop, 
 Like glittering sparks of sunshine, in the cup ? 
 
 Str. Wisely divined! true sunshine, as thou sayest. 
 Drawn from the fount above of light and life 
 By thrice great Hermes, our immortal master : 
 Its end is purer life and deeper knowledge. 
 
 King. Nay, rather mirth, and gay abandonment 
 Of every sober care — 
 
 Str. Sure end of wisdom ! 
 
 All earth-born care, O King, is vanity, — 
 The toil of thought, which leads to no result. 
 But wastes the present, and leaves gloom behind. 
 The present moment is the wise man's life ; 
 The future is not, and the past is gone. 
 Time is a runninsr line of atom instants — 
 Some bright, some black, some glad or sorrowful.
 
 Tlte Idolatress. 89 
 
 The worst is by the wise man soon let pass. 
 The happiest most enjoyed — the end unheeding ; 
 Which Fate or Fortune in good time must settle. 
 Fools speculate on far contingencies, 
 Which rarely happen until life run by. 
 
 King. Thy meditations have a pleasing touch 
 Of that mock-wise loquacity which wine 
 Is aptest to inspire. It doth not need 
 One half thy prosing rhetoric to prove 
 The wit by wine inspired. I would prefer 
 A little folly from thy tuneful imps 
 To speak its inspiration. They can best 
 Dress in light song the bubbles of the brain, 
 Which otherwise dance madly. 
 
 Str. They, King, 
 
 Are but the creatures of thy sovereign will. 
 And present at thy word. 
 {Stranger waves his arm, and the voices Jill the room.) 
 
 Voices. Now mirth is awaking. 
 And labour is still. 
 Soft moonlight is breaking 
 O'er forest and hill; 
 And beauty walks forth in the planet's soft light. 
 For the dawn of young love is the dewfall of night.
 
 90 The Idolatress. 
 
 Wher.e Kedron^s gveen billows 
 
 Leap sparkling along, 
 From the depth of its willows 
 Soft gushes of song 
 Pour, hushing the wild with enchantment divine, 
 For all song is silent, soft warbler, but thine ! 
 
 And Echo, repeater 
 
 Of every strain. 
 Who flings it back sweeter 
 And softer again : 
 The spirits of air give a fainter reply. 
 And the still depths of ether respond with a sigh. 
 
 The glad earth is flinging 
 Fresh scent on the gale. 
 From roses new springing 
 Down Hinnom's sweet vale ; 
 Where the night flower's pale smile glimmers up thro^ 
 
 the dew. 
 By the stars faintly tinged with their mystical hue. 
 
 But haste ! — with new fleetness 
 The happy hour flies ;
 
 The Idolatress. 91 
 
 O waste not the sweetness 
 Too swiftly that dies ! 
 Dull Care like a guest nninvited doth run, — 
 The delicate spirit of bliss must be won ! 
 
 'King. My breast is over-full : I pray you, leave me 
 
 [Stranger disappears.) 
 To hold communion with these pleasing thoughts, 
 "Which rush upon me with power long unknown — 
 Ha ! gone ? I saw not how, — or can the senses 
 Be thus the captives of a waking dream. 
 So strange to life's experience, yet so like 
 The seemings of reality ? The scene. 
 With all things round, is palpably familiar : 
 Can shadows vain so haunt the waking sense ? 
 
 [Approaches an open lattice.) 
 There is a sweetness in the night. V\\ taste it. 
 The dream brought healing, if a dream it were, 
 And leaves a dance of feelings in my breast 
 Too gay for mere illusion ', or if so. 
 All that conveys delight is fair illusion. 
 All is as fancy paints it, and the sense 
 Yields to receive the coloured outward shapes 
 Of what we deem reality. The scene 
 Which now before me spreads so fair, where sleeps
 
 92 The Idolatress. 
 
 The moonlight over streets and terraces. 
 
 And tracts of bowery distance far retiring, 
 
 Where shadowy masses blend with fading light, 
 
 As if calm sleep and death together meeting, 
 
 Lay spent in conflict of their elements. 
 
 Which should be deemed the gentlest — what are they 
 
 More than a lovely dream, which the dull truth, 
 
 With morning's first grey gleam, shall disenchant 
 
 Into the trite and base realities ? — 
 
 Dark roofs, poor tents, rude paths, and sun-dried fields, 
 
 Now merged in yonder soft obscurity. 
 
 Which lies like sleep around their nakedness. 
 
 So ends the painted phantom of man's life ! 
 
 Yet wherefore seek this knowledge ? Why believe 
 
 Yon beautiful expanse of moonlight scenes 
 
 Less than their lovely seeming ? It is well 
 
 To be so cheated : were all dreams thus brijrht ! 
 
 Yet is it strange, that scene of solemn beauty 
 
 Should wake these dull imaginings. * -^ ^ 
 
 * ^ * On the air 
 A far low murmur from the villages 
 Of Judah's land, by distance and the breeze 
 Attempered into concert with the streams, 
 Comes blended on the ear from many a vale. 
 And now soft music on the ah' of night
 
 The Idolatress. 93 
 
 Pours its low modulations from afar, 
 
 So faint, the listener scarce can deem he waketh. 
 
 But lists in sleep the visionary song 
 
 TVhich binds the soul of Nature in repose. 
 
 \_8cene changes. 
 
 SCENE V. — A Garden in the Suburbs. 
 
 Queen Tamar and Attendants. 
 
 Tarn. It may not be ! Your low sweet voices pour 
 A momentary soothing ; but "'tis vain. 
 My heart hath long resigned the dream of hope 
 For aught to cheer the desert of this life. 
 My dream of joy was short and soon awakened, 
 But sorrow hath been a perpetual guest 
 For long and mournful winters — yet to me 
 Familiar : ^twere easier to endure 
 The touch, tho' sharp, of merely selfish woes. 
 I freely had resigned my breast to wrongs. 
 And taken sorrow-for a guide to heaven ; 
 But as my spirit nears life's weary end. 
 It hath more grieved for others, sadly fearing 
 The wrath to come on Israel's wanderings^ 
 Neglectful of the Covenant in which
 
 94 The Idolatress. 
 
 It claims to stand protected ; the sole refuo-e 
 Of those who hold the truth of God on earth. 
 Now blindly swerving to Idolatry. 
 But Heaven will guard its own ; and ah ! too surely- 
 Deal righteous vengeance on the guilty head. 
 
 * * ^ But why should I bewail the nation's 
 danger, 
 I who of all that live have most endured 
 From my lost lord's desertion ? O, I've wept 
 Till the exhausted fount of tears grew dry, 
 And the tired brain grew clouded. Reason's light 
 Was for that season mercifully darkened ; 
 For it was mercy, when my sorrows grew 
 Too painful for the spirit tortured so 
 To bear and live. 
 
 Att. {shig.) Yon cypress lifts its graceful height 
 Through darkness to the starry heaven, 
 And from it the sweet bird of nig'ht 
 
 Pours forth the song of placid Even : 
 So meek and lowly sweet it falls. 
 That one mis^ht deem on heaven it calls. 
 
 '&' 
 
 Deep silence else enchains the calm. 
 Untroubled hour of sleep.
 
 Tlie Idolatress. 95 
 
 Save where we walk with plaint and psalm, 
 
 And they who wake to weep : 
 We tread the hallowed paths around, 
 As they who walk on holy ground. 
 
 Ye angels pure, who watch unseen. 
 
 Guardians of Salem's holy hill^ 
 And hover throuij-h the clear serene 
 
 To guard its roofs from nightly ill ; 
 If peace and love be of your train, 
 O l)id them to our hearts ao^ain! 
 
 ~o 
 
 Tam. ""Tis a calm eve, and doth, in spite of sorrow. 
 Refresh the fevered breast : the sunless west 
 Breathes over the parched earth, while gradual Night, 
 Upstarting from her day-long rest, unfolds 
 Her sentinel eyes above, which now look down 
 Successive from their posts, as if to keep 
 Her stillness unperturbed, in which sad thoughts 
 Posocss the soul, and dreams of parted joy. 
 Which are themselves a star-light, faint and far 
 Seen through the darkness of life's length of days — 
 Ah me — so dark — so endless ! 
 
 Cho. They endure 
 
 In the fierce trial of adversity. 
 Whom God doth favour most, and walk forth pure
 
 96 The Idolatress. 
 
 From the red furnace ; thenceforth become free 
 From the world^s vain defilement, and serene 
 As all that frets the bosom ne^er had been. 
 Tain, {iiot listening.) Yet have I known 
 Most nameless consolationSj dreams too wild 
 To be wished back when gone ; for so it was 
 In that strange interval of life, I sunk 
 In some wild visionary void, and felt 
 Soothed by fantastic nothings. These soon passed, 
 Leaving no trace upon the memory 
 But that they were. ■'Twere sin to wish them back ; 
 Yet, when they left me, with more lifelike thoughts 
 Pain hath revived. 
 
 Cho. In deep affliction's troubled hour. 
 When sorrow rules the breast. 
 
 And earthly soothing hath no power 
 To quiet its unrest ; 
 
 When mirth but maketh jarring din, 
 
 And all is heaviness within ; 
 
 To thee we fly, O God, to thee ! 
 
 When earth denies relief. 
 And still more tremulously flee 
 
 In storms of deeper grief :
 
 The Idolatress. 97 
 
 When all around to darkness turns, 
 
 Thine heaven-sent li<2;ht more brightly burns. 
 
 Tam. {not heeding.) For grant that all his love came 
 back, O never 
 Can that sweet trust, the soul of love, return 
 To this crushed heart, in which all earth-born hope 
 Has perished ! 
 
 Cho. O Queen, it is not well 
 
 For those who sorrow, to drive hope away : 
 Hope beams with cheering ray 
 
 Into the lone dim cell 
 Upon the weary captive^'s tedious hours ; 
 
 Even in the dungeon gloom to softly tell 
 The hope of outer day, 
 
 Slanting athwart the dim vault^s dusky grey, 
 To glad the sight 
 With airy gleam of freedom's glorious light. 
 
 Tam. Your tongues grow wanton, children. Alas ! 
 where. 
 In what fond bosoms of this woe-worn earth 
 Can these light fancies live ? I must forget them. 
 These hopes are flown to heaven. And yet in truth 
 This gentle eve recalls them half, — so soft 
 
 H
 
 98 Tlie Idolatress. 
 
 With dewy sweetness, on the night air breathing 
 
 Through forest, field, and woody wilderness. 
 
 From flow'ry Hermon to the roseate wild 
 
 Of Sharon and of Ilinnom. Haply, now 
 
 In yon suburban outlet many an eye 
 
 Looks out on the sweet night, and fondly dreams 
 
 Of frail and perishing pleasures, reading blindly 
 
 The solemn glories of yon holy vault 
 
 Into most earthly meanings, best forgotten 
 
 Before its all-pure spirit. Merciful 
 
 But just Chastizer of the sinful breast. 
 
 If young unbroken spirits in their hour 
 
 Of vanity forget Thee, O ! not thus 
 
 Thou in thy wrath consume them, as I wither 
 
 For too much resting in this world^s vain trust ! 
 
 Strike not the lowly tamarisk with the bolt 
 
 That cleaves the mountain cedar, which stands bare, 
 
 Leafless and blighted, in the healthful breeze 
 
 Which breathes around it vainly — never more 
 
 To bud new verdure. 
 
 Cho. In vain, with wandering fancy she would win 
 Brief respite from sad thought, 
 The pang her woes have wrought. 
 Still memory unsubdued holds rule within
 
 Tlie Idolatress. 99 
 
 With heady force, 
 
 Even as the current turns the pilot's course 
 To the fell cliff unsought. 
 
 But; stay ! she speaks — 
 
 Tam. It was a night 
 
 Most like to this in loveliness, when we. 
 All jubilant with nuptial gaiety. 
 Saw Salem rise in prospect, and its towers 
 Limned darkly on the golden dusk. Then he 
 Stood pointing out its templed height afar. 
 Shadowed beneath the gorgeous base of heaven. 
 And bade the minstrels strike the sounding chord 
 To joyful measures known in Solyma, 
 And canticles of love to wretched me ! 
 O, it was madness then ! but so it seemed, 
 Heaven smiled ; the dim earth, touched with the soft 
 
 echoes, 
 Glimmered mysterious transport : all appeared 
 As if no sorrow could obtrude asjain 
 Into so sweet a world. So joy deceives ; 
 So to the happy all speaks happiness. — 
 But, list ! what accents of shrill discord break 
 This still, contemplative twilight ! Listen, friends. 
 
 C/to. The heathen now with impious clamour meet 
 
 II 2
 
 100 The Idolatress. 
 
 To pay foul offering to the rising Moon, 
 
 And with accursed orgies dissonant 
 
 Salute the unconscious orb which God hath made, 
 
 As Queen of Heaven — loudly triumphing 
 
 As if heaven heard not — unavenged. 
 
 Tarn. Heaven surely hears, but not 
 With mortal's erring vengeance ; nor adopts 
 Our passion to chastise what we condemn. 
 Man, to all sins abandoned, oft would call 
 Down fire from heaven on other's sin, and blast 
 Whom he should but i-ebuke in mild compassion. 
 Were his thouo-hts lightning:. Woe is me, 'tis well 
 They are not ! 
 
 Clio. Yet might even angels weep 
 To see the ungodly triumph, while the just 
 Still suffer, and yet sadly hold their trust. 
 And, wondering, ask how long will Justice sleep. 
 
 Tam. They know not God who trust not; — but 
 again 
 Harsh music wounds the ear from yonder height. 
 
 Att. Let us away, that we may curse them not ! 
 
 [Scene changes.
 
 TJie Idolatress. 101 
 
 PART THE THIRD. 
 
 SCENE I. — The King's House. Morning. 
 
 The King, asleep; Attendants. 
 
 King [asleejp). Be merciful, Jehovah ! 
 
 1*^ Att. So, he dreameth. 
 
 %nd Att. See how he writhes. His features are 
 distorted. 
 'Twere good he were awakened. 
 
 King. Spare, O spare ! 
 
 1*^ Att. Ho, my lord King ! 
 
 %nd Att. Awake, O King, awake ! 
 
 King. Mercy, mercy, mercy ! 
 
 1*^ Att. O King, arouse thee ! 
 
 King {awaking) . Ha ! who is near ? 
 
 ^.nd Att. Thy faithful slaves, O King. 
 
 King. Where am I ? Ha ! ^tis morning light ! 
 Quick, say 
 Heard ye or saw ye aught ? 
 
 \st Att. Nought, truly. King. 
 
 King. I was then in a dream — a dark mysterious 
 dream. 
 I think ye did look strangely terrified.
 
 102 The Idolatress. 
 
 As having gazed on somewhat. It must be — 
 Ye surely must have heard that Voice ; more awful 
 Than loudest thunder, when the hollow vault 
 Seems rending by the crash. And still 
 Your looks bespeak some recent fear. 
 
 \8t Att. We heard 
 
 Thee only uttering cries of fearful import,, 
 And hastened straight to wake thee. 
 
 J^^^ng. Cried I aloud? 
 
 %nd Att. Loud as one striving in some deadly grasp, 
 Beyond description fearful. 
 
 King. Such it was. 
 
 I joy to see your well-known countenance. 
 And the pale morning light. I yet do tremble. 
 I would not sleep again for wealth of Ophir ! 
 Lift up yon curtain. Ha ! the air smells sweetly ; 
 The sun is not yet risen: 
 
 1*;^ Att. The red east 
 
 Glows with the promise of a cheerful morn. 
 
 King. In living Nature's compass there is nought 
 That bears remote similitude to that 
 Most terrible Voice and Eye. — Can sleep alone 
 Create what Nature knows not ? or wild Fancy, 
 Distorting Nature in her maddest moods. 
 Shape with such truthful seeming ? "What is power
 
 The Idolatress. 103 
 
 If kings can be so haunted, and chained down 
 Within the prison house of sleep ! 
 
 IndAtt. O Kin"-, 
 
 Arise ! come forth ! shake off the mists of shamber 
 Which yet sm'round thy pillow — see young morn 
 Gleams through the lattice softly. 
 
 Kiyig. ]\Iorn is dark 
 
 To fear-struck conscience as the night's dark noon. 
 [Enter the Afflicting Angel, invisibly. 
 
 Affl. An. Thy soul is forfeit, Solomon. 
 
 King, Alas ! 
 
 ]\Iy inward thoughts rebel, and seem to utter 
 Strange hostile voices, as an inward spirit 
 Taking the will by force. O, could I fly 
 This painful Being, though to die ! 
 
 Affi. An. Thou-'lt soon 
 
 Find terrors darker than thy darkest thoughts. 
 
 King. O for some cavern in the ocean's deep. 
 Where devils may forget me, for they live 
 To haunt high places and the roof of kings ! 
 
 AJjl. An. Their temple is the godless breast : in vain 
 Thou seekest to fly thyself. 
 
 King O could I fly myself ! 
 
 O for the privilege to lay down life 
 More fearful than the tomb !
 
 104 The Idolatress. 
 
 ^#. An. There devils haunt. 
 
 King. But who can say what spectres haunt the tomb. 
 In the abyss of darkness punishing 
 The deeds they prompted with angelic face. 
 
 1st Att. How black his visage grows I — his counte- 
 nance 
 Seems scarcely human. {Aside.) 
 
 2,nd Att. Breathe not, for his eye 
 
 Turns this way, searching in the empty air 
 For some invisible Power. 
 
 1st Att. He doth listen. 
 
 King. If ye be cursing, curse aloud. I'll hear ye, 
 Were your tongues scorpions, freely — rather 
 Than this malignant stillness. 
 
 {8urve}jhig grimly^ Well, why mute ? 
 
 Aff,. An. If curses can bring comfort, be content : 
 A nation's curses, deep, sincere, and just, 
 Breath'd up against thee, reach the gates of heaven. 
 
 'i.nd Att. Sure something evil lurketh in this place: 
 A sense of awe surrounds us, and the dread 
 Of some mysterious Presence. 
 
 1*^ Att. Peace, be silent. 
 
 King. Ay, even so ; all curse, tho' not aloud, 
 On me, the centre of all earthly hate 
 And heavenly displeasure. Slaves, come hither : 
 What do ye mutter there among yourselves ?
 
 Tlie Idolatress. 105 
 
 'ind Att. O Kingj come forth ! something of evil 
 kind 
 Lurks in this place. Come up ; the sunny roof 
 Looks brightly o'er the land^ and there behold 
 Heaven^s sunshine on that glorious work of thine, 
 Thy Temple — thy great offering to the Lord. 
 
 Affi. An. And that confronting roof, on Gerizim, 
 Thy offering to Baal. 
 
 King. Ye are devils ! 
 
 Have ye no sword, or javelin, to strike with ? 
 If ye are murderers, I sit ready here. 
 
 Affi. An. Alas ! thy soul is ripe for the abyss. 
 
 'ind Att. His features grow contracted, and assume 
 A stony hardness. [Affl. Angel departs^ 
 
 \st Att. He must die, unless 
 
 This raving fit departeth. 
 
 2?i£? Att. Lo ! a step. 
 
 [Enter Tamar. 
 
 Ist Att. ^Tis Egypt's hapless daughter. 
 
 2nd Att. Ah, how changed ! 
 
 1*^ Att. All save in goodness. 
 
 {Tamar stands as if stupefied^ 
 See, she fain would speak : 
 How wildly bright that sorrow-speaking eye 1 
 Her pale lips tremble faintly. 
 
 Ind Att. See, the King
 
 106 The Idolairess. 
 
 Looks fixed on vacancy, like one bereft 
 
 Of all perception. He beholds her not. 
 J d Att. Be silent : now she speaketh. 
 Tam. {breatJdessl// ) My lord Kinc- ! 
 
 He doth not hear. Alas ! he knows not m^. 
 
 He hath forgotten all. O, can it be 
 
 Thus clean forgotten ! — thou who hast ever been 
 
 My heart's one thought next God — forgotten so ! 
 
 I am thy Tamar ! 
 
 ,'ind Att. O, most honoured Princess, 
 
 The King is not his wonted self ; some dream 
 
 Hath so disturbed his reason. He is scared 
 By some imagined spectre. 
 
 Tam. {not heeding^) O, my King ! 
 
 I come to share thy sorrows, not to chide, 
 Or wring forced kindness from an altered mind. 
 O King, look back on better days gone by ! 
 Think all I was to thee when thou wert happy ! 
 Look, what thy hate hath made of her who loved thee ! 
 Ah me, that still cold eye ! 
 
 \st Att. {aside.) At last he looks , 
 As one who sees, yet hears not, nothing moved. 
 Alas, poor Princess ! Scarce her trembling limbs 
 Support her sinking frame. Her bosom pauteth 
 As if nigh burstinsr. 
 
 *t>" wuxouiu^.
 
 The Idolatress. 107 
 
 2w6? Ait. How she gasps for breath ! 
 
 1^11 speak to her. O Princess ! let thy servant 
 Offend not, offering water from the brook 
 To cool thy fevered lips. 
 
 Tam. [not heeding.) O, but one look, — 
 See here how sorrow withers, in the strife 
 Of crushed affection t ^ ^ * 
 
 {The King looks %oith an absent gaze.) 
 ^ * ^ List, and I will tell thee 
 A tale of more than mortal suffering, 
 All for thy sad desertion. The gazelle. 
 The savage of the desert, hath shed tears 
 Upon me gazing, iu those dreadful hours ; 
 For I have wandered many a lone wild way. 
 In solitary places where nought human 
 Dared stand beneath the sun^s all-burning noon ; 
 Still calling on thy name, till the fixed cry 
 Became the hearths sad life, and all beside 
 Were but as portion of the one wild woe. 
 The spirit of the blighted world, pervaded 
 By my one sole all-shadowing despair, 
 With which all darkened. On the wailing winds 
 Sad whisperings came across the sea-like sands 
 Of the flat desert, and the empty caves 
 Howled back portentous echoes from the shore
 
 108 The Idolatress. 
 
 Of Sodom's gloomy waters. Oft I thought 
 
 These melancholy waters smiled to see 
 
 A form more blighted, and a breast containing 
 
 A deeper spring of bitterness. At last 
 
 There came the touch of that mild sympathy 
 
 Which ever dwells in Nature. Oft while roaming, 
 
 Borne on the wing of visionary thought, 
 
 To the attending ear of gentle Night 
 
 "Was sung my hapless fortune ; and I thought 
 
 The constellations still remembered me — 
 
 Even since I was a child in Pharaoh's land 
 
 I knew and loved them — for they were unchanged. 
 
 And shed their cooling dews on my parched brain : 
 
 For tears had ceased, and sorrow had become 
 
 A wild and terrible mirth ; and for a season 
 
 Life was a dream that left no certain record. 
 
 It was a painful waking, such as comes 
 
 Upon the morrow of some dire event, 
 
 Bringing the dread reality ; — alas ! 
 
 There are not words to sound the gloomy depths 
 
 Of human woe, for they are bottomless 
 
 As the black deep of Hades ! — but 'twas o'er, 
 
 And still returning Reason brought no peace 
 
 To comfort the sick heart. 
 
 Ah me ! he heeds not.
 
 TJie Idolatress. 109 
 
 1*^ Att. {asic?e.) What sorrow can be witli that woe 
 compared, 
 When the loved eye grows cold and strange ! 
 
 Znd Ait. Be still ! 
 
 Tam. O must I leave thee thus ! Remember how 
 We twain were once one soul ! O look on me ! 
 
 [Breaks into lamentation^ 
 
 \st Att. There comes a living lustre on his face ; 
 His eye grows heedful, and his lips dispart. 
 
 ^nd Att. Stay, Princess — list one moment ! 
 
 1*^ Att, He looks on thee, 
 
 And tries for speech. 
 
 King. I know not if I live. 
 
 Or have departed to the land of shades, 
 The realm of gloomy Hades. What are ye. 
 Whose terror-stricken faces dimly gaze 
 Through the infernal mist, like suffering spirits? 
 Your idols cannot save ye now ; — and yet 
 I heard a voice, too hallowed to be here 
 Among the guilty. * -^ * 
 
 ^ "k * These are shapes of life. 
 And gleams of upper day. O, friends ! 
 
 1*/. Att. O King, 
 
 Behold who stands beside thee ! Princess, speak. 
 
 Tam. {still weeping) . My hapless lord, one look !
 
 no The Idolatress. 
 
 2nd Alt. He sees her now. 
 
 With gaze of recollection. Memory- 
 Wakes at the spell of that familiar voice. 
 That thrills on the^ old bosom-chord, and calls 
 Old harmonies to life. 
 
 Kinff. Thou must be Tamar ! 
 
 Or else, if not, thou-'rt haply of the train 
 Whose errands are of mercy. Yet why here 
 Among the irrevocably damned ? 
 
 1st Att. O friends. 
 
 His reason is clean g-one ! 
 
 '^nd Att. Hush, hush ! 
 
 King. And yet 
 
 Heaven's angels weep not so, nor bear the stamp 
 Of mortal agonies on their sweet brows. 
 
 Tamar. They have not known this killing agony ! 
 They have not known vain earthly love, or seen 
 The lover's eye grown strange and cold, or felt 
 Confiding fondness on itself thrown back. 
 
 King. My injured Tamar, it is even thou ! 
 
 [Scene changes.
 
 The Idolatress. 1 1 1 
 
 SCENE II. — Mount Olivet. The worsUj^j^ers of Astarte 
 are assembled on the summit. A irazen Altar, on 
 which afire is hnrning. 
 
 Priestess, Jerada, &c. 
 
 Jer. Now venerable mother, wherefore thus, 
 Doth some strans-e duhiess cloud our solemn rite ? 
 Do we not meet in triumph — conquerors 
 Of the insulting Hebrew and his God, 
 Too long ascendant o'er the Gentile race, 
 The servants of great Baal ? Why thus pale ? 
 Ye look like felons all. 
 
 P/-. The signs are evil : 
 
 The sacred tapers bm-n with ghastly paleness. 
 The ima^e of the Viro^in Queen is bathed 
 With a chill moisture. On each heart there is 
 The shade of coming ill. 
 
 Jer. My heart disclaims 
 
 These ill-timed bodings : they but wrong the Queen 
 Astarte, from her Eastern chamber rising 
 To claim her ancient sceptre, and assert 
 The cause of all the gods. 
 
 Fr. Nay, Princess, see 
 
 Yon heavy mist from Siloa's valley rising
 
 112 Tlie Idolatress. 
 
 Between us and the virgin majesty. 
 Shadowing the plain beneath. 
 
 Jer. But not on us. 
 
 We stand in her propitious smile — the goddess 
 Frowns upon godless Israel. 
 
 Pf . (starting.) Heard ye aught ? 
 
 A Sidonian. Nought now. Some minutes past I 
 heard 
 The distant murmur as of many voices 
 Gathering upon the plain. 
 
 Another. I heard the same, 
 
 Rising and falling on the fitful breeze, 
 And swelling in the silent intervals 
 Of our own choral chant. 
 
 Pr. Nay, hark again ! [A pause.) 
 
 \st Sid. I heard low signals, faintly audible. 
 As from the cliffy steeps and thickets near. 
 
 Jer. Fear magnifies ! These noises all are proof 
 Of our security. Ye did but hear 
 Our sentinels upon their post, accosting 
 Each one his fellow watcher. 
 
 Pr. I mistrust 
 
 These Hebrew watchers ! List — what cry was there ? 
 That was no friendly sound ! 
 
 ^nd Sid. I heard a whispering
 
 TJie Idolatress. 113 
 
 Close by yon mossy crag. 
 
 Pr. Who struck the censer ? 
 
 Sid. The censer was untouched. A brassy sound 
 Rung sharply from yon thicket. 
 
 Pr. , Noble Princess, 
 
 'Tis time we were away ; there^s danger near ! 
 
 Jer. We may not choose a fitter place to die 
 Than at this altar. 
 
 \st Sid. See, the moon is darkened ! [recess 
 
 Ind Sid. There's somewhat shining from yon dark 
 Among the bushes. 
 
 Pr. 'Tis a warning gleam, — 
 The fire's reflection from some burnished casque 
 Or pointed steel. I counsel swift retreat. 
 If yet we may. 
 
 Jer. 'Tis but the prying gleam 
 
 Of some o'er-curious sentry on his post. 
 These fears ofiend the Virgin majesty. 
 Be cheered, and all is well. Come, raise a loud 
 And joyous choral cry, and with one voice 
 Throw off this shameful panic. 
 
 [^T/ie^ strike up a loud hymn to Astarte, during which 
 the Hebrews rush in from the surrounding crags 
 and thickets, and overturn the altar. A faint 
 resistance is made, and the Sidonians are routed 
 and scatter down the mount. X
 
 114 Tlie Idola iress. 
 
 SCENE III. — l)aw7i. A retired glade on the same 
 hill — Jerada is home in ly her Attendants, faint 
 and stiff ering pain, 
 
 Jer. Here let me rest^ these pains can fear no foe 
 Here, on this grassy mound. 
 
 Att. But three steps onward 
 
 A mossy trunk lies fallen upon the steep ; 
 Its massive branches form a throne-like seat. 
 Where thou can'st rest at ease. 
 
 Jer. A throne, good Miriam, 
 
 Is not a chair of rest ; yet well may serve. 
 As oft of old, to die on. Oh, my side ! 
 
 Att. My Princess suffers only cruel fatigue. 
 
 Jer. Nay, nay. My gentle Miriam, this is Death 
 Sits down before life's fortress. I must die. 
 Even on this goodly throne thy love hath found me. 
 
 Att. O my dear mistress ! 
 
 Jer, Prythee, weep not, maiden. 
 
 I would not have thee cloud my latter moments 
 With mortal weakness. Eather let us triumph ; 
 I for the Virgin Queen of heaven am crowned 
 A glorious martyr. Come, now smile, my maiden. 
 Ah, ah, 'twas a sharp pang !
 
 The Idolatress. 115 
 
 * * See in the grass 
 Yon small bright wreath of sweet and tender flowers, 
 Starring the lively green, like a gay freak 
 Of hope in life's young spring. 
 
 Att. Some mountain blossoms ! 
 
 In these hills common. 
 
 Jer. "Well, whatever they be, 
 
 I pray you pluck them tenderly, and weave them 
 Into a chaplet with this slender branch. 
 And place it on my brow, as thou can'st well. 
 So as may grace a victor's death. * * 
 
 * * So, well. 
 
 Att. Were it not well from this lone spot to seek 
 Some shelterino- roof? — the dawnino^ hour is chill. 
 I'll gently help thee down the deep descent. 
 And we shall haply meet some friendly arm 
 Still hidden in the neighbouring copse beneath. 
 
 Jer. It may not be ; among yon hostile roofs 
 Not one shall more shut out the light of day. 
 The face of Baal, from these afflicted eyes. 
 Now soon to close on every mortal care. 
 And on this hated and unfriendly land. 
 I would collect my thoughts, and calmly settle 
 The obtrusive doubts and painful memories 
 Which press upon my bosom, and disturb 
 
 1 2
 
 116 Tlie Idolatress. 
 
 The calm and liigli serenity of one 
 
 Whose duty to the gods is bravely done. 
 
 Here let me meet death^s messenger, as bravely 
 
 As I have met their enemies : and here, 
 
 During the heavy hours of summer day 
 
 Now opening slowly, she for whom I die 
 
 May send some favouring sign to cheer and soothe 
 
 My parting moments, with a high assurance 
 
 Of glad reception in the starry courts 
 
 Where heroes dwell with Jove. 
 
 * ^ * Nay, weep not, maiden, 
 But go and leave me, for I must be lone. 
 At eve thou mayest return; till then 
 Keep faithful silence. Thou wilt then find here 
 All that of me remains, in life or death. 
 
 \_Scene changes. 
 
 SCENE lY,— Before the Temple. 
 
 Watchman — Levites, meeting. 
 
 1st Lev. Ho, Watchman ! Thou hast heard the 
 clamorous din, 
 "Which hath so awfully disturbed the night ?
 
 The Idolatress, 117 
 
 Watch. I were deaf else. It came upon the ear 
 From yonder eastern summit. 
 
 \H Lev. Hast thou noted 
 
 Aught to explain so loud and strange report ? 
 
 Watch. Yes, many from the very scene have passed. 
 Strangers and men of Judah — some in terror. 
 Excited all, as from some recent fray — 
 But clamouring as they thronged upon the street, 
 While hardly could aught certain be collected 
 From the discordant medley of mixed voices. 
 Some quarrelled as they came — some uttered shouts 
 Of drunken triumph ; flushed and blood-stained 
 
 faces 
 Told plainly of some deed of violence. 
 
 'i^nd Lev. Spoke you with none, nor tried to gain 
 Somewhat more special ? 
 
 Watch. As I could gather, 
 
 A mighty concourse from the neighbouring towns 
 And streets suburban, in the middle watch 
 Assembled to assail the heathen meeting ; 
 And, guided by their howling blasphemies 
 In honour of the Moon, surprised their gathering. 
 And scattered them with slaughter. 
 
 Ist Lev. Say you, slaughter ? 
 
 Watch. Report hath numbered some few slain.
 
 118 The Idolatress. 
 
 'Tis said the Tyrian Princess hath been seen 
 Borne slain, or hurted sorely, from the press. 
 
 1*^ Lev. Sir, this were sad. I would it were not so : 
 She hath a noble nature, though obscured 
 By the blind superstition of her country. 
 
 '^nd Lev. 'Tis said her clearer reason hath been 
 striving' 
 Against that baseless faith in stock and stone — 
 The lying legends of idolatry. 
 
 1*^ Lev. There is not in the human heart a strength 
 To break the bond of habit — less, perchance. 
 The pride of party worship, and the names 
 Which rabble faction gilds its idols with. 
 Yet doth a nobler essence dwell within 
 The soul of constancy to home-taught error 
 And faith to honoured names — if but sincere. 
 And stained by no base aim of avarice 
 Or sordid self-ambition. 
 
 '^nd Lev. If she die. 
 
 One good may follow — if the royal dotage 
 Be from her hurtful influence set free. 
 
 [Scene changes.
 
 The Idolatress. 119 
 
 SCENE \.— King's House. 
 King, Tamar. 
 
 Tarn. There is no ground for such dread appre- 
 hension. 
 The judgment comes not till the trial ends. 
 The holiest mortal had been lost indeed 
 Beyond redemption, could not mercy pardon 
 While life is left for penitence. 
 
 King. This may be 
 
 For less offenders. I stand dreadly lone, 
 In a pre-eminence of sacred trust 
 To Satan^s self against the Lord betrayed. 
 
 Tam. Great was the sin, but sin it were to deem 
 Sin cannot be forgiven. 
 
 King. Alas ! Tamar, 
 
 Sin needs atonement by the eternal law 
 Which rules the heaven and earth, and binds the 
 
 justice 
 Of the All-Ruler. This, man cannot make. 
 Himself judged forfeit, unless one be found 
 Spotless and holy, and of worth to weigh 
 Against a world's transgression. 
 
 Tam. In the heaven
 
 120 The Idolatress. 
 
 There's love to rescue a poor contrite soul 
 From that cruel grasp ; and if thy guess be true. 
 That Man will yet by love divine be sought — 
 And glorious expiation free the world 
 From him who dares the Omnipotent. 
 Thy part is but contrition. 
 
 King. Listen, Tamar, 
 
 And thou shalt hear a dream. 
 
 Tarn. Oh ! put no faith 
 
 In the delirious phantasies which crossed 
 Thy fevered sleep's distemper, doubtless swayed 
 By recollections stamped within the brain. 
 When conscience plays the part of fancy, shaping 
 To fearful forms the dim untjoverned moving-s 
 Of the still wakeful functions of the mind. 
 
 King. Asleep or waking, mortal man is ever 
 The sport of error and of vain illusion ; 
 But, granting all thou sayest, not the less 
 May He who made the thinking part of man 
 To yield obedience to the unbidden seizure 
 Of dreaming phantoms, so employ the same 
 To bear true intimations of His will 
 For menace or for warning — oftenest 
 Speaking to mortal man in mystic guise. 
 Most apt and safe for man's infirmity,
 
 TJie Idolatress. 121 
 
 That which to waking sense were present death. 
 
 But only hear, and judge. I'll tell thee all. 
 
 Beginning in due order. Overnight, 
 
 Fevered with short and unrefreshing sleep, 
 
 I started up, to cool my hurning temples 
 
 In the free air. Softly the gentle night 
 
 Rolled westward in its starry course; the land 
 
 Lay sleeping in the moonlight ; all was still. 
 
 Save whispering leaves and distant murmuring waters. 
 
 Refreshed and soothed in the pure air, I sat 
 
 Wondering, and pleased to feel at last so free 
 
 From agonising thought, and deeply charmed 
 
 In the sweet quiet of the lonely hour. 
 
 When sleep fell o^er me, so entranced : but not 
 
 The slumber meet to follow such calm mood — 
 
 ^Twas a black plunge into a dread abyss 
 
 Of horrors past Conception's power — a dream 
 
 Beyond the scope of slumber terrible : 
 
 I yet scarce dare to speak it ! 
 
 Tarn. Pains imparted 
 
 Grow lighter to the heart. 
 
 King. Well. Scarcely sleep 
 
 Had closed the external senses, and shut out 
 The fading images, dissolving all 
 To formless shadows, — sudden from the swarm
 
 122 The Idolatress. 
 
 Of unshaped, nameless, and receding things, 
 Each darker and more wild, a heavy tramp 
 Of some unnatural footsteps, slow and ponderous. 
 Came up the stairs of hell, with solemn echo 
 That seemed to grow more near. I seemed awake 
 Within the realm of dreams, and still of self 
 Intensely conscious. As the earthquake's shock 
 Moves the still mirror of a glassy lake. 
 And rocks its faint reflections to confusion. 
 Thus strangely did that footfall shake my spirit 
 Into a chaos of wild terrors. Next 
 Came voices uttering moans of agony, 
 Followed by imprecations long and loud ; 
 And then came spectral shapes — fiends undisguised- 
 Grim Dagon — horrid Moloch — Astareth — 
 And myriad more infernal faces, rising 
 Like smoke from the infernal Pit, 
 Rolled densely up with black variety. 
 Suspending terror in its ghastly spell. 
 A little while this lasted ; then, as many 
 Confused reflections settle into form 
 On the subsiding waters, so ceased all. 
 And one dark Shape before me stood alone. 
 Summing their horrors in its dreadful self. 
 It spoke not ; but the terrible eye expressed
 
 The Idolatress. 123 
 
 What language may not utter — the dread spell 
 Which draws the tremblincy victim to the dano^er 
 From which it shrinks dismayed — a glance 
 That murders hope — for in that stony face 
 Relentless cruelty and changeless hate 
 Sate like eternal night. I could not turn, 
 Nor dared even think, lest that malignant eye 
 Might catch the movement of my thoughts. At 
 
 last 
 I summoned courage, and a scarce-formed prayer 
 Rose from my prostrate spirit. Suddenly, — 
 'Twas but a heart-beat, still it seemed 
 To bring a wondrous change, — swifter than thought 
 The depth of darkness grew more bright than day ; 
 The shadowy fiend of night with night was gone — 
 A glance beheld, and lost it. In its place^ 
 Mailed with a loftier terror, stood a Form 
 Bright as a Prince of Heaven, with front that 
 
 bore 
 Supreme command, and awful eye that seemed 
 To sum infinity, and glance quite through. 
 Even to the inmost lurking cell of sin. 
 I stood abashed and terrified, desiring 
 For triple darkness, to escape that Eye ; 
 But darkness fled before it, and disguise
 
 124 The Idolatress. 
 
 Left bare the dismayed spirit. Then arose 
 
 A still small voice, uttering these direful words — 
 
 " These are thy gods, whose altars thou dost build 
 
 Upon my holy hills. Now, hear thy sentence : 
 
 Whereas thou wert exalted and endowed 
 
 Above all earthly kings, and art found faithless. 
 
 Thy kingdom shall be rent, and by thy sons 
 
 A broken sceptre shall be handed down 
 
 Until the end. And thou thyself shalt be 
 
 A proverb and a warning for the wise 
 
 Of every generation, to distrust 
 
 In power and riches without faith in Him 
 
 From whom all power is given." Swift as it 
 
 came 
 That Eye was gone, that fearful burden ended. 
 A glimmering light of earthly twilight trembled 
 Upon my opening eyelids ; and I strove 
 To lift my voice in some convulsive cry ; 
 But yet feel that tremendous Presence here, 
 And deem it not unreal. 
 
 Tamar, Take comfort. King. 
 
 ■ If this was, as I deem, a warning vision. 
 Warnings are not in judgment but in mercy 
 Sent to the favoured when they walk astray. 
 As wisest mortal may. When Supreme will
 
 Tlie Idolatress. 125 
 
 Aims final punishment, 'tis not in dreams. — 
 The earth cleaves, or the messenger of wrath 
 Strikes the devoted breast. 
 
 King. Such reasonings 
 
 Impart small comfort to the self-accused. 
 I might submissively endure the lash 
 My own offence has on myself drawn down, 
 But sink beneath the unmeasured consequence 
 Upon my race, my people, and the land 
 So favoured — yet for me abandoned 
 To suffer for the guilty ruler's sin. 
 Shall Israel execrate my name throughout 
 All ages of the world ? 
 
 Tain. Thou for thyself 
 
 Ask grace in low humility and trust. 
 Leave Israel to Him whose steadfast plan 
 Is not to be disturbed by mortal error. 
 He will set right a nation's guilt, or man's, 
 "With equal ease ; and to His final ends 
 Bend human sins or virtues — measuring not 
 By consequence or partial incident ; 
 Too little in the sum of infinite 
 And power supreme, to stay or rectify 
 Whatever errs, through space or time, a world, 
 Or mortal human atom of earth's dust.
 
 126 The Idolatress. 
 
 King. Thou reasonest not unwisely ; but, alas ! 
 This guilty consciousness must vainly seek 
 For consolation in the vast expanse 
 Of infinite perfection. The vast whole 
 May keep its boundless order, and be right. 
 Yet that small atom feel its agony. 
 
 Tarn. That agony, if sorrow for offence. 
 Is but the dawn of holy penitence, 
 Precursor of a change — itself the working 
 Of power divine upon the human breast — 
 Not mortal wisdom, but in mercy given. 
 And leading to forgiveness. Think not more 
 Of Israel ; God will work His own wise will, 
 Whether in wrath or mercy, for His people. 
 By thee or else by others. 
 
 King. Israel 
 
 Is henceforth nought to me nor I to Israel. 
 I was but tyrant of the hour. Ere night 
 There may be some confusion in the council. 
 Striving who shall be master. I sit yet 
 Where I have sinned, breathing the moment's 
 
 air. 
 Where shall to-morrow find me ! 
 
 Tarn. O dismiss 
 
 These madd'uing fancies ! Give thy heart to Him
 
 Tlie Idolatress. 127 
 
 Who holds thee in His hand. The penitent 
 Ne'er rose unpardoned yet — kneel here with me ! 
 
 \Scene changes. 
 
 SCENE VI. — A lonely thicket ; JePvADA seated, as in 
 
 former Scene. 
 
 Jer. I would not, if I might, outlive this day 
 For Israel's throne. I bear within me wounds 
 To which the assassin''s blow is but a salve, 
 And aught that pains the flesh but balm and oil. 
 Never shall I descend alive ; and here 
 I deem it best in peace to die, apart 
 From all unloved and hostile eyes. Ere night 
 I shall be in Elysium. * '^ ^ 
 
 •3f -x- -x- Yet, methinks 
 
 I do not feel my wonted confidence. 
 ^Tis fearful to stand thus upon the shore 
 Of the dark ocean, from which none return 
 To tell the hopes or terrors of the way, 
 Without some sensible assurance. * * Baal ! 
 And thou, bright Virgin of the silver car. 
 Who now begins to pale amid the cold. 
 Grey twilight of the west, — fair Queen of heaven, 
 If ye be truly gods, and I have not
 
 128 The Idolatress. 
 
 Sold life for a chimera — if I have 
 
 Been loyal to my fathers' faith, and served ye 
 
 Even against reason and the volumed scroll 
 
 Of Hehrew records, and the wondrous deeds 
 
 Of him the insolent Hebrews call their God; 
 
 If honour, influence, and pride of place 
 
 Could never taint my loyalty ; if taunt 
 
 And threat have failed to shake my constancy. 
 
 And cruel fate now ends the strife at last, — 
 
 If ye be aught but fables, it is time 
 
 To show your truth ! Let me not pass to Orcus 
 
 Abandoned, lowly, and unhonoured thus ! 
 
 Now, by my labours and untimely fate — 
 
 By your divinity, by whatever is 
 
 The most tremendous invocation 
 
 Your priests or sovereign pontiff have employed. 
 
 Your faithful martyr calls you ! 
 
 \ Enter, from the copse, a Ti/rian youth. 
 
 Tyr. Princess, hail ! 
 
 I greet your queenly highness {lowing low). 
 
 Jet. {startled) What art thou? 
 
 Tyr. Thy genius, and the Spirit of thy spell. 
 Beloved of the gods, what seekest thou ? 
 
 Jer. If thou hast so far knowledge, I would learn 
 Whither the spirit goes when life departs.
 
 The Idolatress. 129 
 
 Ti/r. To its last dwelling. 
 
 Jer. This I know ; but where ? 
 
 Sid. Fair Princess, cease 
 To vex with such unprofitable questions 
 Thine honourable end. Thou shalt have all 
 Thy native gods can give. Thou'lt know ere night 
 All I can tell. 
 
 Jer. But canst thou not declare 
 
 The home of happy souls — where live the good 
 Who have been faithful to our native gods 
 And deified inhabitants of heaven? 
 
 Ti/r. When dead, one moment shall convey thee 
 thither ; 
 Meanwhile, distrust not. 
 
 Jer. Gentle Spirit, pardon, 
 
 If mortal terrors speak more loud than faith. 
 I pray resolve my fearful doubts, and truly 
 Speak. By the spells thou ownest, I conjure thee, 
 By the supremest Power known above, 
 In heaven, or earth, or sea, that thou tell truly 
 What thou art, and they are, and in what home 
 Their faithful dead abide ? 
 
 Ti/r. It is a world 
 
 That rests in its own shadow, far beyond 
 The sun's enlivening beam — unknown on earth 
 
 K
 
 130 Tlie Idolatress. 
 
 To living mortal — for thy gods reserved. 
 
 And the devoted souls they most approve. 
 
 This truth may well content thy faithful heart. 
 
 Thou with thy gods may'st feel secure to dwell. 
 
 Untroubled more by this world^s noise and glare. 
 Jer. Alas ! thou mockest. Even while speaking 
 yet 
 
 Thy visage alters to a scoffing change 
 
 Of laughing malice, as one in delight 
 
 To inflict and dwell on tortures. Such most 
 surely 
 
 Is not the destination of the pious. 
 
 Or self-devoted virtue. 
 
 T^yr. Even so. 
 
 Even there we dwell. Our foe is on the throne. 
 
 And little heeds the Gods whom you have honoured. 
 
 Or Virtues which enthrall them. Soaring pride. 
 
 And ardent love of freedom, and stern hate, 
 
 Spurning subjection, or the servile chain 
 
 Of misnamed order, or authority 
 
 Of any tyrant : thus we have been doomed 
 
 For many high and meritorious acts 
 
 To never-ending slavery, prolonged 
 
 By our own deeds. 
 
 j^j. What then shall be the end ?
 
 Ue Idolatress. 131 
 
 Have ye no hope ? 
 
 Tj/r. Our doom is hopeless — 
 
 There still is consolation iu despair, 
 Freedom iu utmost woe. 
 
 Jer. What meanest thou ? 
 
 Ti/r. We are free to curse aloud ; and this much, 
 We are our own fixed centre, and admit 
 No fear and no suhjection. At the lowest 
 There is no further fall. We hold our own 
 With proud disdain, and stubborn constancy. 
 As thou hast done, a goddess anions: erods 
 Among- the heathen canonised. 
 Now thou hast thine answer, 
 I trust it much consoles thy parting soul. 
 
 Jer. I know thee now. Thou art from gloomy 
 Orcus, 
 A spirit from the blasted crew whom Baal 
 Cast out from heaven of yore. 
 
 T^^- Thy summons rose 
 
 Invoking BaaPs own godhead. I descend 
 From Baal to his faithful worshipper. 
 How feel you now, fair Princess ? 
 
 I^^' Once again 
 
 If thy gUb tongue can once speak without mock, 
 What is yon dazzling orb which now begius 
 
 K 2
 
 132 . The Idolatress. 
 
 To light tliese hills ? I ask thee by the spell 
 Thou dost obey. 
 
 T^r. It is the sun ; no more. 
 
 And nothing less. A very fair device 
 Contrived to light the earth, and be a god 
 For those who sagely scorn a God unseen, 
 And trust their sense. 
 
 Jer. And, so, it hath no life? 
 
 Tyr. No life ! 
 
 Jer. Or no presiding deity ? 
 
 Tp'. Thou art over curious. I fear 
 To abate thy pious zeal by close acquaintance 
 With these inanimate divinities. 
 
 Jer. Thou'st said enough, false spirit ; but I thank 
 Thy lying tongue for a true confirmation 
 Of many haunting doubts. Truth oft appears 
 In the exposure of the cunning wits 
 Used to confound it. Thy keen malice 
 Hath been o'er hasty for thy ill design. 
 I know ye, and renounce ye evermore. 
 
 Ti/r. Late wisdom, truly, fair Idolatress ! 
 Fair votaress of the Moon, believest thou 
 The Prince of Hell would so unclose thine eyes 
 To leave thine old ancestral faith at last. 
 Were not it late to turn, when life is ended.
 
 The Idolatress. 133 
 
 And late conviction endeth in despair? 
 
 The presage of eternal woe, which most 
 
 Thy fathers^ gods delight to improve and play with, 
 
 For those they chiefly cultivate on earth. 
 
 Jer. They are no gods, but devils, fiends accurst ! 
 
 Ti/r. Blaspheme not. Princess, nor offend thy lord, 
 The sovereign of thy life to come, the god 
 Of Syrians thousand altars. 
 
 Jer. Him I know not. 
 
 Nor ever have, with conscious faith, acknowledged. 
 I have adored bright things in heaven and earth, 
 God's own creations — in pure ignorance. 
 If it be ignorance, my heart's sole guide. 
 Nor could I well be wiser than the fathers, 
 The priests, and sages of my native land. 
 God of the Hebrews ! if this fiend speaks truly, 
 Why hast Thou made all nature so divine 
 That it is hard to sense not to adore 
 The beautiful and glorious ? It is certain 
 Thou dost not dwell in darkness, if yon light 
 Be of Thy giving. Take, oh, take my spirit ! 
 If Thou hast made it, for it is thine own. 
 And only turns to Thee. 
 
 Tyr. In vain, weak mortal. 
 
 Will He accept a soul all black with sin ?
 
 134 The Idolatress. 
 
 Thy life's election may not be recalled 
 By senseless protestation. Can a moment. 
 The last poor fluttering throb of sinful life. 
 Repair long years of dark idolatry, 
 Or cancel Satan-'s seal ? On thy lost soul 
 All words are henceforth idle. Come away : 
 Thou art already of the dead. 
 
 \_A step is heard, and the Tyrian 
 retires among the thicket. 
 Jer. He's gone ! 
 
 And with him gone this foul oppression 
 That made even death more painful. 
 
 ■^ ^ * Some one cometh 
 With a more life-like seemine:. 
 
 Enter Isduafil. 
 
 ■^ "^ * O my brother ! 
 Isd. How is it with thee, sister ? 
 Jer. I know not. 
 
 I have not in me many moments' life. 
 And these have not been solely left to pain. 
 Haunted by some smooth sprite — which hath in 
 
 malice 
 Revealed more truth than my past life hath learned. 
 But with no friendly aim — with cruel craft 
 Striving to urge despair.
 
 Tlie Idolatress, 135 
 
 Isd. Thou hast been dreaming, 
 
 Under the sense of outward paiu. 
 
 Jer. My brother, 
 
 I have not now the strength to tell thee all 
 I have heard and suffered, or the brighter change 
 I feel within my spirit, making death 
 More calmly peaceful than life ever was. 
 
 Isd. Thou^rt faint, dear sister, only. Let us leave 
 This savage spot. One quiet hour of rest 
 Will renovate thy strength. 
 
 Jer. One little hour ! 
 
 How much lies in the compass of that hour 
 Beyond the Seer^s conjecture, or the reach 
 Of reason^s most adventuring flight to grasp ! 
 Shaping the future vainly from the pains 
 Or strivings of the present — as a mirror 
 Reflects its spectral shadows on the eye. 
 As objects seen afar. Ah, me ! I faint ! 
 O mercy, God of Israel ! * * -J?- 
 
 Isd. * ■* -^ Thy sense wanders. 
 Come, let me bear thee from this horrid wild. 
 I'll bear thee gently, sister. 
 
 Jer. Kneel beside me. 
 
 And drive away the dark One while I die ! 
 
 Isd. Thou shalt not die, my sister ! Many years
 
 136 Tlie Idolatress. 
 
 Are yet before thee — years of peace and honour — 
 Blest in thy new-found light and happiest rescue 
 From Satan and his soul-destroying crew. 
 
 Jer. My life hath been a sinful dream. I wake 
 To know myself, as in the new-born day 
 Truth breaks upon the sleeper. O how much 
 My heart needs cleansing ! to wash out the stain 
 Of that false life — that waste of God-given time, 
 In treasuring wrath. O Thou to whom alone 
 The gifts of life belong ! to Thee I fly. 
 Thou only canst release the soul from death, 
 And conquer the Destroyer. * * * 
 
 * ^ * Sweetest peace 
 Grows gently on my breast, and blest assurance 
 Comes as an answer to devoted thought 
 Prom some unseen respondent, which, beyond 
 All power of mortal utterance, shapes the thought 
 To its own hallowed meanings, overcoming 
 All fear of death within. I thank thee, God ! 
 I see heaven open, far above, — and now 
 A gracious angel beckons. Farewell, brother ! 
 Be warned by me ! 
 
 Isd. Jerada ! She is gone !
 
 THE 
 
 COURT OF DARKNESS. 
 
 A POEM.* 
 
 Scene — The Mountains of Ejjhraim, 
 
 Time — Evening. The assembly of the Fallen Angels 
 appears groiiped over the broken and precipitous 
 summits. 
 
 Scene I. — Nisrock, Aza, Thammuz, Tyriel. 
 
 Nis, 111 met, Etlierial Powers : — whom Sammael 
 Compels thus rudely from the land and deep — 
 From Nile to Eastern Pharphar, or the steep 
 Of rocky Carmel : with disturbing spell, 
 — Wherever our devoted legions dwell — 
 Dispersing like the golden dreams of sleep* 
 Those charmed pomps and pageantries which quell ' 
 To brief repose our clinging agony. 
 
 • Published in Blackwood's Magazine, 1828.
 
 138 The Court of Darhiess. 
 
 Tham. Alas ! with these fallacious glories flee 
 The gay attire of spell-raised loveliness, 
 And all the wanton forms of phantasy, 
 Which we, to win the love of mortals, wear, 
 And hide us from ourselves. The charms which dress 
 Earth's fond and passionate idolatry 
 With specious light, as evening doth suffuse 
 Yon westward vapours with her Iris hues. 
 
 Nis. Yon sunset colours on the western air 
 Are not so fleet to perish, or so fair : 
 For swifter than the cloud-horn lis^htning 
 Blights from the stately elm its garh of spring, 
 We feel and wither in the fatal blast 
 Of his dread summons. Ere the spell be past 
 Each godlike apparition is unblent 
 Dissolved into its pilfered element ; 
 And we are what sin made us — first and last — 
 Wan — thunder-stricken — images of doom ! 
 
 Aza. Our own black thoughts return : — as from 
 the tomb. 
 The eternal doomed, to judgment call'd, arise, 
 O'erladen with soul-sinking memories — 
 Thoughts which can die not ; could they but destroy 
 The wretched things who feel them — happy they ! 
 
 T'l/r. Now truce with thy vain soothsaying ; — or say
 
 TJie Court of Darhiess. 139 
 
 Why are we thus disturbed? Stern Sammael 
 Dallies with us like victims^ — his rough sway 
 Now briefly intermitting — now more fell. 
 Breaking our gloomy rest, our short oblivion 
 Of him, and of ourselves, and our dark fate. 
 
 Aza. He hates. And -'tis the wont of brooding 
 hate 
 To close in well-dissembled slumber's guise 
 Its venom-spotted coils and serpent eyes. 
 And thus disguised in ambush grim await 
 The moment when its victims deem all still. 
 Nis. The rest he suffers, but repairs for ill 
 The sentient spirit; and new-strings the breast. 
 Lest cravino- malice lack its vulture food : — 
 
 Aza. But when it hath the broken nerve renewed, 
 And, all forgetful of the foe, we rest — 
 He comes with retribution from afar, 
 As darkness follows the Hesperian star. 
 
 Tham. But who may tell what woes peculiar brood 
 In our grim star to-night. 
 
 Nis. We must abide 
 
 The pestilence of his collected ire. 
 Spent in the strife of solitary pride — 
 Ambition, whose long toil hath nothing won — 
 He waits till the diurnal course hath run.
 
 140 The Court of Darhiess. 
 
 To vent his surcharged bosom's angry fire 
 On us who must endure it. 
 
 Tham. He doth sway 
 
 With the sick pride of a fall'n potentate 
 Who seeks to hide his ineffectual state, 
 And in dim darkness wears his faded ray 
 Of crazed and visionary pomp. 
 
 Nis. When day 
 
 Hath disappeared beneath yon dusty portals. 
 Which stand in clouded gold on the bright west ; 
 When dewy sleep falls o'er earth's weary mortals, 
 These heights shall by his giant foot be prest, 
 Emerging from night's darkness. 
 
 Tyr. Day grows dim 
 
 Within yon cloudy curtain of pale gold 
 Which mantleth its fair shrine with shadowy fold, 
 And earth's deep vales put off their gaudy trim. 
 
 Nis. The many tints of eve melt into one 
 Embrowning shade, from Gilead to the plain, 
 As, like a fiery giant, the broad sun 
 Hurrieth apace to meet the western main. 
 
 Tham. Oh ! that a wish might stay its fatal 
 course ! 
 
 Nis. Its course is fatal — it is past the force 
 Of angel power to stay it — and must on,
 
 Tlie Court of Darkness. 141 
 
 UncheckM by mortal, or immortals' care, 
 Till it hath measured its appointed share 
 Of seasons, and its tale of days is done. 
 
 Aza. It is the circling wheel of destiny, 
 And with its revolutions all thing's fleet 
 By many courses to one end, to meet 
 Assembled on Time's awful boundary — 
 And part for ever into light and darkness. 
 Powers and Dominions shall meet there, to hear 
 The repetition of our fatal story 
 Read from the Accuser's book, before the throne ! 
 And all heaven's eyes burn fierce on us alone : — 
 And in our fall all vital Beings glory, 
 From the winged hierarch to the child of clay — 
 Even man ! — death's victim — slave to every ill 
 That flesh inherits in its mortal day. 
 Clothed in the light of some fair star, which still 
 The powers of earth and air in fear await — 
 Eor which wise mortals watch heaven's eastward 
 
 gate — 
 Even man shall rise as from the tomb new born 
 To look on our sad plight with hate and scorn. 
 
 iVw. That sorrow shall be spared thee, awe shall 
 
 drown 
 All triumphs and all glories — ^lost in one.
 
 142 The Court of Darkness. 
 
 As the starr'd sphere grows faint before the sun ; 
 And all those varying spirits he chain'd down 
 In one deep^ over-mastering suspense — 
 One breathless pause of fear and mystery. 
 Tham. Not the bri"'ht ano^els ! 
 -^^*- Angel sympathy 
 
 Shall turn their eyes to those weak souls, which 
 
 tremble 
 Between our fate and theirs. 
 
 -^za. Upon them, we 
 
 Shall darkly gaze where they in light assemble 
 And — stained with guilt which, cannot be forgiven — 
 Behold the blessed angels, erst our peers, 
 Where our fates cross and part 'twixt hell and heaven : 
 For one bright bitter moment — never more ! 
 But, in that momentary meeting, store 
 More grief, than an eternity of tears 
 Can ever weep away. 
 
 T^r. These murmuring fears 
 
 To our unnatural forms new horror add ; 
 We want not such vain plaints to make us sad. 
 Aza. We are too light and vain for our sad fate. 
 Ti/r. We, too, could weep — might tears but wash 
 away 
 The written record — the predestined date
 
 The Court of Darkness. 143 
 
 Of that unknown, unutterable day, 
 
 Which even the sinless fearfully await : 
 
 But nought is left the destined, save to linger. 
 
 Forgetful of the doom they may not shun. 
 
 Among those fair scenes, where creation's finger 
 
 Hath writ no record of the deeds we''ve done. 
 
 Aza. Fallen angel, no ! Sad memory haunts us 
 still, 
 Far as the spirit's boundless sense of ill. 
 Our darkness dwells within — we may not fly 
 The inborn tortures of the conscious mind. 
 Seek we the light : Reproachful light on high 
 Bids conscience seek the refuge of the blind ! 
 No ! — not the scorpion pang — the fiery throe. 
 Which starts the quick nerve from the burning vein — ■ 
 The rack of insane terror — guilty woe — 
 The demon of the human heart and brain — 
 Wring our pale victim, as we writhe at this 
 Reproachful symbol of abandoned bliss ! 
 
 Ti/r. Peace, Aza ! silence thine ill-boding scream ; 
 Thou scarest away the sun before his time. 
 
 Aza. Ay, thou weak angel — now his latest gleam 
 Is on the faded heaven. 
 
 Tkam. To the left 
 
 Dost thou not see yon thickening vapour rise
 
 144 The Court of Barhness. 
 
 Like a dark yew-tree to the sable skies. 
 
 From the bare j^ranite's thunder-smitten cleft ? 
 
 Tyr. Who rises from beneath it ? 
 
 All, Sammael ! 
 
 Scene II. 
 
 Sammael, Angels, Chorus. 
 
 8am. Spirits, whose birth-place is the highest 
 heaven. 
 Whose home is in Gehenna^s awful star, 
 Usurpers of earth's altars — earthly gods ! 
 Or how shall I address you ? Revellers ? 
 Minions of gaudy light, who love the sun. 
 And dare to bask ye in his beams of glory ? 
 Or fiends of darkness ? — for like such ye look — 
 Ye have of late forgotten whose ye are. 
 Your proper functions and dark destiny j 
 Ye have become ambitious and refined ; 
 Genii of virtues and moralities — 
 Spirits of pomps and places ; deities 
 Of actions, passions, elements ; — array'd 
 In all that charms the eye and soothes the sense : 
 Ye ransack nature for ambrosial tastes. 
 
 I
 
 The Court of Darkness. 145 
 
 And decompose the sunbeams for attire. 
 Courting repose and vain forgetfulness 
 Ye slumber on soft breezes and fresh flowers ; 
 And dwell apart, or meeting as earth''s gods. 
 Make honour mean with mutual reverence. 
 Rarely with man — or if ye walk the world, 
 ■'TIS to seek fanes and votarists, not victims. 
 Was it for this, spirits accurst I for this 
 I lost celestial empire ? To establish 
 On earth a sensual stye for craven fiends ! — 
 Was it for this ? that ye may dwell secure 
 In light, I may not look un withered on. 
 Earth lacks not revellers ; that such as you 
 Should lift their owl-eyes to the glorious day. 
 And mock its noon of beauty with most foul 
 
 And phantom aspects ! 
 
 Cho. Taunt not thy slaves, lord of the burning 
 throne 
 
 With honours thou hast given — 
 
 With blighted beauty — hope o'erthrown ; — 
 
 We, too, have dwelt in heaven ! 
 
 What are earth's glories to repay 
 
 Immortal glory passed away ! 
 
 Remember all we lost, and deem 
 
 Earth's respite brief from woe — 
 
 L
 
 146 The Court of Darkness. 
 
 A light which trembles o'er the stream 
 
 Ere yet it dash below — 
 
 Where hell's eternity doth spread 
 
 Its shoreless billows dark and dread. 
 
 Nor grieve thou, if to every wiud 
 
 Our thrones and altars rise — 
 
 "Where'er our standards gleam, behind, 
 
 Thine own black banner flies : — 
 
 Our deeds of seeming light, when done, 
 
 'Tis thine own triumph flouts the sun ! 
 
 On templed height above the wave 
 
 "Where spells of power are uttered \ 
 
 In mystic shrine within the cave 
 
 "Where saying dark is muttered — 
 
 Though gods within be deemed to dwell, 
 
 Oh, are they not the gates of hell ? 
 
 All things that precious be, and all things fair. 
 
 From the lone desert to the roofs of man — 
 
 All the bright fields of air. 
 
 All the green wave doth span. 
 
 Are of our winning, and obey thy powers. 
 
 Thine empire — to enjoy them, ours. 
 
 Sam. To mortals leave these vain and idle toys 
 To fool themselves with, till they are like us, 
 Immortal grown in sin and suffering —
 
 The Court of Darkness. 147 
 
 "lis not the fuming altar, festal chaunt, 
 
 The solemn pomp, the wreathed sacrifice. 
 
 Can make ye that ye are not — heroes — gods. 
 
 Can flattery vanquish fate, and lies repeal 
 
 The eternal edict, which, once heard, even yet 
 
 Rings o'er the gulf of many a thousand years 
 
 Redemption to our victims, woe to us ? — 
 
 In vain ye blind the superstitious Gentiles j 
 
 Unless our empire be established here 
 
 O^er Salem's mount and fatal Galilee, 
 
 Earth's empire is as dust before the wind ! — • 
 
 But this hiach end demands far other means 
 
 Than the poor play of mock divinity. 
 
 Watch with enduring toil, the Foe sleeps not, 
 
 But from heaven's height laughs with immortal scorn. 
 
 To see his foes thus purblind at the brink 
 
 Of the unfathomed pit ! Behold ye not 
 
 The footsteps dread of your arch-enemy 
 
 Stampt on the ground ye tread? Do not your 
 
 pleasures 
 Proclaim the hand that forgeth pains for you ? 
 When ye behold at morn yon granite hills 
 Bask in their Lord's serene and silent sunshine ; 
 When ye inhale the sweet fresh atmosphere. 
 Which mantles with life's breath the rolling workl 
 
 L 

 
 148 The Court of Bareness. 
 
 Oh ! can ye dure be joyful ? Dare ye raise 
 Your pLantom eyes to yon sidereal host, 
 Which throngs Infinitude with fearful brightness. 
 And hope your darkness may defy his light, 
 Or fiends exult at noonday ? Know ye not 
 His eye-beam and his spirit compass you. 
 His thunders dwell around you ? yet ye sleep ! 
 
 Cho. We slumber not, dread chief: what mortal man 
 Escapes our fierce assay ? 
 
 What moment, since the human world began. 
 Have we surceased for victims still to play 
 In the contemptible game of mortal life. 
 
 With repetition weary ! 
 Mingling with man's illusions, love or strife. 
 
 Or project airy. 
 Do we not glitter in the far-sought gem. 
 
 Gay garment, gold ? 
 
 Flit we not round the uneasy diadem. 
 Whispering proud thoughts to things of earth's vile 
 
 mould, 
 Prompting the base to stratagem. 
 
 To strife the bold ? 
 Do we not tempt the needy slave to stealth. 
 And win, by secret lure, or cofFer'd wealth, 
 
 The sensual or the cold ?
 
 TJie Court of Darkness. 149 
 
 Do we not win the wise man's willing ear 
 
 With specious pleas. 
 Tempting from virtue's stern career 
 
 To fatal ease ? 
 The hunter with barbed sheaf and bended bow, 
 Breathes not with keener glow 
 The mountain's morning air — than we to chase. 
 With fine-wove wiles and fair entanglements 
 Our human quarry. His, less delight 
 When the dun stag comes tottering to the ground — 
 Or savage bird pierced on its airy round. 
 Flaps down with useless wing through the thin air ; 
 Than ours, when round the victim to thy power. 
 We flit, in life's last hour, 
 To whisper horror, and our own despair. 
 
 8am. Now speak ye like yourselves ! But this I knew. 
 That ye are evil ; I did but complain. 
 That so much wickedness is frustrated 
 By your strange vanity. Ye love to dream 
 That ye are still in heaven, to play the angel 
 That men may deem you good. 
 
 Cko. Infernal father. 
 
 Who call us good, are in no doubtful way 
 To find their error on some luckless day. 
 
 Sam. Were ye but honest in your ill intents
 
 150 The Court of Darkness. 
 
 'Twere well enough. I never did suspect ye 
 
 Of any goodness truly. But enough — 
 
 We waste our darkness here upon ourselves, 
 
 Yon southern cross that slowly weareth round 
 
 The restless axle of the polar heaven. 
 
 Turns westward toward Arabia, and the dawn 
 
 May pry upon our synod grim, before 
 
 Our work's half done. Know, ye are called 
 
 To grace this visitation with the account 
 
 Of what ye do in this contested world. 
 
 Our battle-field with heaven : since 'tis but meet 
 
 From time to time to muster our array 
 
 Of Powers and Virtues — ere we be surprised 
 
 By that mysterious foe which must be met 
 
 On some all-dreadful morn. So, now in order 
 
 Let each declare his doings. Or do thou. 
 
 Grotesque and pyebald Spirit, who dost wear 
 
 A fitting livery for courtly shows. 
 
 Declare their titles and pretensions. 
 
 Lest we may cheat some devil of the rank 
 
 He doth pretend to wear. 
 
 Momtts. Sire in this 
 
 We fear not to account : Here's Nemesis, 
 Ask what she doth, you'll hear some precious tale, 
 Will make your eyes run o'er with fiery gladness. 
 
 1
 
 Tlie Court of Darkness. 151 
 
 See this gay spectre^ with the harpy nail 
 
 And venomed eye, the fount of bitterest bale, 
 
 She is the fiend that smiles the world to madness ; 
 
 She is called Venus : and you speckled imp 
 
 That by her side doth limp 
 
 With malice-glittering glance, 
 
 He is the god of love ; he leads the dance 
 
 Of folly ending in the abyss of sin ; 
 
 His are the revels and the lauo^hino; hours 
 
 The gay enchantments and the wanton bowers. 
 
 The tender ditties and smooth roundelays 
 
 That wake fierce fires. 
 
 And wile fond mortals in the willing maze 
 
 Of soft desires. 
 
 Sam. An imp most laudable ; 
 
 *Tis well he doth not show his pleasant face, 
 Or it would scare them sober. 
 
 Mo. So it falls 
 
 Oft, when his votarists are most deluded 
 He cannot hold his malice, but peeps out. 
 And then they laugh no more. 
 
 Sam. Vain little fool ; 'tis better laugh than mourn. 
 It is not weeping that weighs down the soul ; 
 Thou should'st steal off, dissolving as a vapour 
 Which first grows doubtful on the eye, and then
 
 152 The Court of Darhiess. 
 
 Is gone, before its absence can be noted ; 
 Leaving the guilt without the gain. But thou, 
 
 {fuming to Monms) — 
 Thou garrulous mooncalf, with thy leering lips, 
 Say, who the fiend art thou ? Thy name on earth ? 
 
 Mo. Men call me Momus, in the realms of Greece, 
 Where our head-quarters are ; I serve yon urchin ; 
 With ambushed folly the unguarded breast 
 I bare for his fine shaft : and smooth the way. 
 Marking each fell enticement with a jest. 
 I have a store 
 
 Of gay pretences and of trifling toys 
 To ornament the way to hell : 
 You'll seldom find me wanting for a jest — 
 Or if it comes not, I can laugh so loud 
 And wreath my visage with such grinning grace, 
 'Twould mock HelFs gloom away. 
 
 Sam. No doubt, no doubt ; thy wryfaced pleasantry- 
 Will much enliven by a little warming — 
 Thy loud mirth will grow louder — thou wilt yell 
 More gaily than the rest ; though much I doubt 
 If they will laugh who hear thee ; nay, poor imp, 
 I would not dash thy gay hyena smile — 
 I do but sport. 
 
 {Turning to another.)
 
 Tlie Court of Darkness. 153 
 
 Come, here is food for mirth ! 
 Thou leaden-looking demon, who art thou ? 
 T^Tiat means thy sable glance and solemn scowl ? 
 Can'st thou not tell thine office, like the rest ? 
 Momus, what means he ? 
 
 Mo. Sovereign king ! he seeks 
 A definition to begin withal — 
 It is his way with men — his thoughts demand 
 Large words, not always to be found at will 
 To clothe them duly. 
 
 Sam. Hath he no meaning, Momus? 
 
 Mo. Not much truly — 
 
 But oft he setteth human craniums reeling 
 With fine distinctions, in disjointed words 
 That seem to hide some sense, and yet have none — 
 A kind of mirthless wit, or sage enigma 
 That hath no answer to it. 
 
 Sam. Then if so 
 
 He can at least say something for himself. 
 
 3Io. If he begins, he'll never stop till doomsday. 
 
 Sam. Solemn demon, say, what is thy name ? 
 
 Fiend. I am Philosophy. 
 
 Sa7ti. I never saw imposture better masked. 
 Or with a fairer name : if thy deep wisdom 
 Can stoop to such a shallow thing as meaning,
 
 154 The Court of Darhness. 
 
 And speak the vulgar tongue, like other devils, 
 I wish to know the mystery of thy art, 
 And how it works man's bale. 
 
 Fiend, I cheat the breast 
 
 With its own virtue and own wisdom, changing 
 All truth into some lying likeness, drest 
 So that the idle world knows not itself. — 
 As yon gay fool deludes with silly jokes, 
 I find grave reasons to the same good end ; 
 As he envenoms earth's light vanity. 
 With idiot laughter hallooing fools to death, 
 So I with deeper art, and wider power. 
 Uphold the pillars of life's mighty dream. 
 I give to fame, to swelling state and wealth 
 Their solid seeming, and false permanence : 
 The prop of grave conventions. I can change 
 Each vice into some virtue ; I can draw 
 Good acts from sinful motives, and persuade 
 The fool so duped how very good he is : 
 I can entice deep wits to lay aside 
 The oracles of heaven and seek out God 
 In subtleties of language. 
 
 Sam. I confess 
 
 Thou art a goodly fiend ; I bid thee prosper. 
 We shall much need thee in the world below,
 
 The Court of Bareness. 155 
 
 With sceptic sense to fine away lielFs pangs. 
 And charm our tortures with the spell of woi'ds 
 That prove them all a dream incredible — 
 Well, nay — I do offend thy dignity — 
 Pray be not angry — I, too, honour wisdom — 
 Thou wilt some day be our prime minister — 
 Only be not too subtle : human hearts 
 Need not much logic to pervert God's laws : 
 Spur not the willing steed. There is no devil 
 More specious than the wilfulness of passion. 
 The breast, far gone from light, spins round itself 
 A curious web of gay illusions. 
 To glide to ruin with a peaceful sense. 
 
 (Turns to another.) 
 Now who art thou, thin fiend, whose wavering eye 
 Wastes its weak glances on the empty air ? 
 Thou lookest as one who hath forgot half way 
 Where thou wert going : hath our craft an office 
 That needs so frail a fiend ? 
 
 Fiend. I teach weak mortals 
 
 To waver and look back — when by some chance 
 They quit the downward way, I then start forth, 
 And cry aloud — " Look back — that path is rough — 
 'Twill task you sorely — and the end is doubtful — 
 Thou yieldest the present for a future good.''
 
 15G The Court of Darkness. 
 
 Or bid the striving pilgrims " rest a little. 
 For that the present day has done its task- 
 To-morrow ever will be time enouirh/' 
 And so to-morrow and the next day comes, 
 As they spin forth from time's incessant wheel. 
 Still to a sinful present slily changing — 
 The morrow that I speak of never comes ; 
 Till the dark night that hath no dawn, surprises. 
 
 Sam. Philosophy may go to school to thee — 
 She hath no such fine vein of fallacy. 
 In all her boasted schools. No other fiend 
 Doth even the thousandth part of thy brave deeds- 
 Thy very seeming weakness is more strong 
 Than fifty scoffing or overmastering fiends — 
 I do approve thee well. 
 
 {Turns to another^ 
 
 And what art thou, 
 Fiend of the keen and space-devouring eye. 
 With lean cadaverous frame and grasping clutch ? 
 Speak, hideous demon. 
 
 Fiend. Dreadful king, 
 
 I am that great one which the world adores, 
 For they who serve thy slave are more in number 
 Than all the dupes of every other god 
 Thrice summed together. I fill the breast
 
 The Court of Darkness . 157 
 
 With that keen love of gain, which they who know, 
 
 Hold light all other loves. My votarists, 
 
 With toil or peril, study, fast, and watch. 
 
 Subdue the soul, and macerate the flesh — 
 
 Spurn all affections, and repel all ties — 
 
 Are more than saintly in their toils and tears. 
 
 To win a little, which, if won at last, 
 
 — For I make thrifty bargains — they shall have 
 
 Approached the gate of Orcus, and in vain 
 
 Expect the golden rest I once did promise 
 
 When life was fresh ; while near in sight ariseth 
 
 The ebon turrets of Gehenna^s portal, 
 
 Hinged by their harpy heirs with raven claw 
 
 To strip them as they pass. 
 
 Sam. Thou shalt be there. 
 
 Surrounded well by clamorous legions. 
 Arch-usurer of hell. I well approve thee — 
 Thou dost not lose thy dupes half way 
 As some of these — thy promises deceive 
 To the last moment. When the heart forsakes 
 Thy golden visions, sense itself hath ebbed — 
 Who will may enter — thou hast won the day. 
 
 [Turns to ariother.) 
 And thou, imperial and high-fronted thing, 
 Thou need'st some merit for thy boastful mien.
 
 158 The Court of Darkness. 
 
 Fiend. I rule in couucilsj and pervert the mind 
 Of kings and their advisers : I inspire 
 The statesman's sense, the wisdom of the world, 
 With all its solemn contradictions — 
 
 The form revering, and the power denying 
 
 Defrauding conscience with a hollow show. 
 I tell the statesman that he is no priest. 
 The cabinet no temple ; and — thus cheated — 
 The limitary law that doth assign 
 To every ordinance of heaven or earth 
 Their meet subordination is soon lost. 
 And man forgets our kingly foe, who rules 
 Alike in court or temple. 
 
 8am. And say who 
 
 Is he who seems to wait upon thy nod. 
 With sanguinary arm prepared to strike ? 
 
 Fiend. He is the god of war—- and prompt as 
 lightning 
 To vindicate the slightest claim I urg-e. 
 Though ^twere a barren cliff in the mid sea, 
 The herbless home of gull and cormorant. 
 With the best blood of populous realms. 
 
 ^am. He needs 
 
 No tongue at least to praise him. 
 
 Fknd. Every clime
 
 The Court of Darkness. 159 
 
 Is glorious with his Laurelled monuments — 
 Each human record crimson with his deeds — 
 Each field is fattened with his offerings — 
 Upon his altars tears are mixed with blood. 
 Yet gorgeous is the pomp, with gold, and plume, 
 And glory vocal in her thousand lays. 
 That lures the martial votary to his shrine — 
 He is a mighty god. 
 
 Sam. No doubt — no doubt — 
 
 Yet mi2:hfcier than useful. I would rather 
 One soul perverted than an empire slain^ 
 We war for souls, not bodies. 
 
 Fiend. • Sovereign sire^ 
 
 Some score of lesser demons follow him. 
 Too slight for separate notice here, who ply 
 Their little trade in secret, winning souls 
 By sure but petty wiles. 
 
 Sam. How name ye them ? 
 
 Fiend, Men call them vices j and their followers 
 Deny them and despise, yet worship them 
 With shame-faced reverence. 
 
 Sam. They are pretty imps. 
 
 Fiend. They do good service both in court and camp, 
 And every other place — without their help 
 The busiest fiend would mostly tempt in vain.
 
 160 The Court of Darkness. 
 
 They sit within the bosom's citadel, 
 With double face, a friendly aspect wearing. 
 To ope the portal for each foe that knocks, 
 Still watching without respite. 
 {Turning to another.) 
 
 Sam. Well, soft fiend. 
 
 With decent aspect, and with face demure. 
 Thou lookest a straggler from the hostile camp. 
 Halting 'twixt heaven and hell. 
 
 Fiend. Great king, even such 
 
 Are they whom I delude with reverent seemings. 
 I sit in temples and in holy places. 
 Prompting unhallowed thoughts, that bring with 
 
 them 
 The hankerings and follies left without. 
 To mingle with men's prayers — impatient 
 Of sin's brief intermissions — 
 I breathe on holy thoughts and good desires, 
 And turn them to some godless vanity. 
 
 Sam. Go on and prosper in thy pious care — 
 Thy charge is precious. Some of these brave spirits 
 Work hard to win souls lost without their aid 
 With a vast waste of good malignity — 
 Bedaubing sin with guilt superfluous — • 
 Heaping the coals of hell, which they will find
 
 The Court of Barkness. 161 
 
 Full heated to their cost. 
 
 {Turning to another) 
 
 And thou, pale fiend, 
 "With hlank astounded aspect, as if thou 
 Wert some damned mortal ? 
 
 Fiend. Mine alas, the lot. 
 
 To strive with men who walk the godly path — 
 To lurk for them in dark by-ways to sin- 
 To stagger faith, or prompt false confidence. 
 And often urge depression, oft despair, 
 And oft in seeming to prevail — alas 1 
 Still foiled by some invisible opponent, 
 That with resistless influence withstands 
 And frustrates all I do. 
 
 Sam. [groios furious.) Ay — so it is — 
 
 Said I not so — ye crew accursed for ever ! 
 What boots it that ye are permitted here. 
 
 While your own fires await you, vainly wasting 
 
 Their fond embrace on helFs vacuity ? 
 
 What do ye here, deforming this fair world 
 
 With evil natures, spiteful to no end 
 
 But to defeat your malice and recoil 
 
 From the scared victim, on the feeble tempter ? 
 
 For thus repentance from your vain seduction 
 
 Mounts trembling to the mercy-seat above, 
 
 M
 
 162 The Court of Barhiess. 
 
 And Grace comes earthward hovering to impart 
 Comfort and healing to the penitent. 
 
 Cho. Stern king of terror, pain hath spent 
 
 Our fiery force of will — 
 Some power to good o'errules the intent. 
 
 Or some recoiling ill — 
 Hell, weaving snares a thousand ways. 
 Finds mercy central in the maze ! 
 
 In vain we purpose, act, advise. 
 
 And shift the treacherous view — 
 
 There is a beam from unseen eyes 
 
 O'erwatching all we do [ 
 So, do we that we would not, — fly 
 
 To the event we shun. 
 And while in fiercest ill we vie, 
 
 Lo, good is done ! 
 So do our acts defeat our will — 
 So circumscribed our power of ill. 
 
 Sam. Ay — ye are weak, because ye court oblivion, 
 And stultify helFs hate with human follies ; 
 Your very victims tempt ye, and ye are 
 Touched with the weak taints of humanity. 
 Ye do forget your natures. Yet for this 
 Ye shall not gain one moment from perdition — 
 Weak ye may be — ^ye must be evil still :
 
 Tke Court of Darkness. 163 
 
 Soft without mercy, without love promoting 
 
 The ends of grace from your malignity, 
 
 As genial warmth glows far, while the live furnace 
 
 Burns inward fiercely still 
 
 [Pausing] — For shame, ye damned! 
 Forget not your immitigable doom. 
 And let remembrance give relentless force : 
 Draw the fell purpose from the blighted hope : 
 Be stern and unsubdued as ye are hapless — 
 
 As ye are fated, fatal. If ye wear 
 
 The frame of beauty and the smile of love, 
 
 Kemember what they cover still and are — 
 
 The sunbeam on Gomorrah's charnel pool — 
 
 The hue that gilds the deadly poison fruit — 
 
 The mask of malice unsubdued, of woe 
 
 Eternal, unreprieved. And what avails 
 
 This low sub-solar world, with its vain charms 
 
 To ease your dismal gloom ? Shall not all pass ? 
 
 Sun, stars, and sparkling waters, and gay shores. 
 
 Towered towns and mountain altars, gods and men. 
 
 Pomps, pleasures, powers — all that glads the heart, 
 
 Or wins the curious eye, or craving taste — 
 
 Shall they not perish, in one moment strewn 
 
 Into that void and black infinity 
 
 In which your own grim prison-star alone 
 
 M 2
 
 1 64 The Court of Barhiess. 
 
 Shall roll its endless way with its sad crew 
 From deep to darker deep, where it shall be 
 My task to teach — 
 
 Cho. O spare us, spare us, dreadful king ! 
 Thy brow with death is crowned — 
 Thine eyes gleam hellish lightning 
 On the pale cliffs around — 
 Thy voice seems as the trump of doom, 
 To seal the abyss and cleave the tomb ! 
 
 8am. — {musing.) How livid consternation's many 
 hues 
 Cloud their scarred brows with fear's deformity ! 
 'Tis a fair sight, and soothes my wounded pride. 
 I love to gaze upon them thus — and muse 
 In calmness upon things that angels fear. 
 Ye worthless fiends, when I behold you thus {aloud) 
 Crouch terror-stricken at the name of that 
 Ye must substantially endure, I feel 
 Strange pity touch my bosom's adamant 
 To think how lost ye are. I could nigh weep 
 Over your hopeless fall ; as the lone granite 
 Pours down the night dew o'er the desert sands. 
 As if it wept for their sterility 
 With softness not its own. Know, hapless fiends. 
 There comes an hour already written down
 
 The Court of Darkness. 165 
 
 Within that book whose words are things appointed. 
 When the page turns, that ne'er folds back again, 
 Moving in dreadful stillness to the end — 
 When ye shall court the things ye shudder at, 
 And plunge into hell's self for very terror. 
 
 Ay, ye may tremble, but the day will come 
 
 When death's wide gate shall open widest, last. 
 For other souls than human. Ye shall court 
 That hideous refuge from the judgment-seat, 
 W^here Mercy^s self, arrayed in light too pure 
 For sin to look at, bids all hope depart 1 
 
 But 'tis enough — ^ye may retire. These thoughts 
 
 May fitlier soothe his loneliness, to whom 
 Terror is a slave. Be diligent 
 Each in his proper station, and obedient 
 To watch and win — be prompt at every call — 
 W^ear pleasure as a mask and not a chain. 
 Be men your victims, not your flatterers. 
 In all things view the end, that, perishing. 
 Vengeance may smile upon your fate, and mingle 
 Triumph with your despair — peopling your prison 
 With human generations. Hence, away ! 
 {^The assemUi/ disappears.) 
 Sam. {alo7ie.) They're gone to ply their ineffectual 
 toil.
 
 166 The Court of Darkness. 
 
 To sow in guilt what they must reap in woe ; 
 
 Heaping upon themselves more deep damnation. 
 
 Thus would I have it. Little once I thought, 
 
 When leagued with me in crime and penalty 
 
 They fell, condemned to an eternity 
 
 Of exile from all joy and holiness. 
 
 And the first stains of sinfulness and sorrow 
 
 Fell like a blight upon their angel brows — 
 
 Myself the cause ; it never crossed my thoughts 
 
 That they could fall so low, or, stead of pity. 
 
 That I could hate them thus. Glory, and power, 
 
 And holy love, and pure intelligence, 
 
 And the serenity of changeless bliss, 
 
 Dwelt o^er them as an elemental essence 
 
 That could not cease to be. I could not deem 
 
 That aught could so extinguish the pure fire 
 
 Of their all sun-like beauty. Yet 'tis changed ! 
 
 So vast a change, and for such little cause — 
 
 A little curious prying into things 
 
 Half told in heaven — the faith of angels there — 
 
 By me not credible or to be borne — 
 
 Involving contradiction and disgrace. 
 
 And so with cavils and irreverent sneers 
 
 I won them to my wish, and they are grown 
 
 Too hateful to be looked on; and I loathe them
 
 The Court of Darkness. 167 
 
 With all that bitter agony of hate 
 
 Which is the fiend's last torture; thus IVe seen 
 
 Some frail fair dupe of amorous perfidy, 
 
 The victim of a smile, by man betrayed. 
 
 Won to debasement, and then left in loathing — 
 
 Alas ! I cannot leave my fatal conquest. 
 
 Oh, if despair could uncreate the past — 
 
 The past ! — undying in its very death — 
 
 The gulf of nothingness that swallows all — 
 
 Impervious save to black regret. ^Twere well 
 
 Could I return to nought, and so dissolve 
 
 This everlasting consciousness of woe. 
 
 In hate and pride imprisoned endlessly ; 
 
 Or that I were the humblest mortal wretch 
 
 That crawls beneath yon shadowing templets height 
 
 Under the sky of Canaan ; so I might 
 
 Lay down this weight of sceptred misery. 
 
 And fly for ever from myself and these ! 
 
 But pride reproves such thoughts : and they are vain! 
 
 The unatoneable deeds of ages, rise 
 
 Like clouds between me and the throne of grace. 
 
 I may not hope — nor fear ; still unsubdued 
 
 As when I ruled the anarchy of heaven. 
 
 Like that famed Roman exile musing o'er 
 
 The dust of fallen Carthage, yet stand I
 
 168 Tlie Court of Darkness. 
 
 Musing the vengeful hour ; self-centred still, 
 I live in fate's despite, firm and impassive 
 To all that chance, and time, and ruin brings. 
 In that disastrous day, when this huge world 
 Shall, as a tempest-beaten edifice, 
 E-ock into giant fractures, and the sound 
 Of the Archangel's trumpet o'er the deep 
 Bid fall the bonds of nature, to let forth 
 Destruction's formless fiend, from world to world 
 Trampling the stars to darkness — I shall gaze. 
 Myself no humble wreck, calm and unmoved 
 Upon the ruin of the works of God : 
 And my last look shall be a look of triumph 
 O'er the fallen pillars of the firmament — 
 The wreck of being, by my deeds achieved — 
 Deeds which o'erpay the power of destiny !
 
 WESTMINSTER ABBEY, 
 
 1835. 
 
 I. 
 
 With solemn fall and sweet the noonday cliime, 
 
 Through choir and cloister grey, repeats the hour 
 
 To the long Dead — another hour of time ! 
 
 'Tis but in scenes like this that voice hath power 
 
 To wake the heart, as it flows thrilling past. 
 
 Through aisles and dim-arched cloisters, wave on wave, 
 
 With long vibration lessening to the last ; 
 
 Like busy man^s vain fancies, which thus fast. 
 
 With transient sweetness, into silence rave, 
 
 Chasing each other down into the grave, 
 
 Whither these echoes murmur as they go, 
 
 The still sad music of that ceaseless tide 
 
 On which the waves of human folly glide 
 
 Thro' life's bright sun-glimpse, to the shades below.
 
 170 Westminster Abbey. 
 
 II. 
 
 It falletb on the spirit like a dream. 
 That such a lone sequestered vacancy 
 Should thus be met, even in the central stream. 
 Where life is loudest. And it seems to be 
 As one had wandered from the worldly track. 
 Where the grim spoiler wends his unseen way 
 ^Mid gone-by scenes — the world of ages back — 
 Moving concealed amid memorials grey, 
 To startle not the world of outer day 
 With scroll denouncing all beneath the sun ; 
 Or, lest his trite old emblems cast a gloom 
 Upon the round so oft and briefly run — 
 The font, the bridal altar, and the tomb. 
 The morn, noon, night of man, even to the blast of 
 doom. 
 
 III. 
 
 Yet here full oft Pride^'s clarion call hath thrilled 
 Along these solemn cloisters full and free : 
 And breathing crowds, with expectation stilled. 
 Have watched the rising morn of majesty. 
 Starring yon shadowy gloom with a rich night 
 Of jewelled splendour, and — more fair to see —
 
 Westminster Ahhey. 171 
 
 Propitious beams from stars of living light, 
 Have rained moist lustre as a o^litterinor shower. 
 Upon some form and front of high command, 
 From the robed prelate's dedicating hand, 
 Rising new-zoned w4th England's sign of power, 
 The Edward or the Henry of the hour. 
 Glorious as new-born daybreak, and elate, 
 A thing too haughty for the touch of fate ! 
 
 TV. 
 
 Oh scene, alas ! of strange extremes : the strain 
 Of triumph hath usurped the mourner's breath !— 
 Yon courtly crowd hath trod with stately train 
 The path yet beaten by the pomp of Death. 
 To-day, the coronation; — yesterday. 
 That sterner pageant, which the self-same way 
 Conducted last month's monarch to the tomb : 
 His equipage of state — the hearse and plume ; 
 His throne, the coffin ; kingly robe, the shroud ! 
 Stript of his smile of influence, and discrowned 
 By the stern victor Death ; his realm, the bound 
 Of that dark vault, where the forgotten proud — 
 Plantagenet or Tudor — darkly wait. 
 In synod grim below, holding divided state.
 
 172 Westminster Ahhey. 
 
 V. 
 
 And thus goes by the glory of the age, 
 
 Leaving small note — for men scarce pass away 
 
 Ere wanes life's aspect, and Time turns the page 
 
 Of things accomplished. Soon the new-born day. 
 
 Robed in new thoughts, casts o'er the grave's decay 
 
 A mantle of oblivion. All but here — 
 
 Here only, through his pillared gloom, the sight 
 
 Behold, the shades of ancient kings appear — 
 
 Here antique echoes murmur to the ear 
 
 Of fancy in her legendary mood — 
 
 Here Saxon, Gaul, rough franklin, courteous knight, 
 
 Pass in their age's form, refined or rude. 
 
 In gliding show successively renewed. 
 
 VI. 
 
 These time-trod pavements have thrown back the rays 
 Of Cressy's sun. The morn of Azincour 
 Hath poured through yon dim oriel on the gaze 
 Of cowled and hooded forms, whose day is o'er. 
 O, glorious were those deeds, those men of yore. 
 The hearts of proof, the arms of chivalry. 
 Which fire the breast to muse on, though they be
 
 Westminster Abbey. 173 
 
 Sunk to the babble of a useless lore. 
 Old rust, and fretted scroll, and storied shield ; 
 Vain playthings, on which idle eyes may pore ; 
 And in their semblance, small memorial read 
 Of those they clad ; in castle, council, field. 
 In England's hour of glory or of need. 
 Old Battel Abbey^s knights — the lords of Runne- 
 mede ! 
 
 VII. 
 
 High spirits have been here in glorious Eld, 
 To every breast that beats to honour dear ; 
 Not by the visioned eye, as now, beheld, 
 But in the noontide of their famed career. 
 Gower, Sidney, Spenser, have been looked on here 
 In honoured life — Surrey, whose name to say 
 Delights the lover's and the poet's ear. 
 And Chaucer old, the father of the lay ; 
 Here Avon's bard hath stood in England's day, 
 Whose glories no fair age shall see restored. 
 Till the muse dies, and time itself decay. 
 Haply some glorious noontide here hath poured 
 Its tinted glory round blind Milton's head. 
 What mighty names, alas ! are numbered with the 
 dead !
 
 174 Westminster Abhey. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 01(1 England ! proud and spirit-stirring name ! 
 Linked with all noble thoughts and feelings high, 
 Thy lion-spirit still hath turned the same 
 Firm front to popular rage or tyranny ; 
 While every land beneath the heaven's broad eye 
 Hath been oppressed by many or by one, 
 Her temple, Freedom still hath found in thee, 
 If^ as some deem, thy high career hath run. 
 And, like Troy's tale, thy glorious day hath been,"^ 
 Here let the sons of thy degenerate age 
 Revere the memory of the Ocean Queen, 
 Nor doubt the records of thy history's page. 
 Though sunk the warrior's arm — though mute the 
 counsel sage. 
 
 IX. 
 
 If thy stern genius on her sea-beat crag 
 Shall howl like Tarshish, to the western main 
 The mournful burthen of her ocean flag. 
 Sunk on those waters once her glorious reign ; 
 While winds that swelled her sail, shall pour in vain 
 Their desolation on the Atlantic wave ; 
 
 * Fuit Illion et ingCDS gloria Dardanidum.
 
 Westminster Alley. 175 
 
 Still, in these venerable walls they sleep — 
 Old Eugland^s sons, the unforgotten brave, 
 Who bore her conquering name on land and deep, 
 Wherever broad ocean's furthest billows lav^e. 
 Here Nelson rests in honour ; here shall come 
 Great Wellington, when Flattery's voice is dumb 
 And factious Slander hath forgot to rave, 
 To glorify the land their valour might not save. 
 
 X. 
 
 But lo ! from shaft to shaft along the file 
 Of shadowy columns, through the twilight grey, 
 A o-lancino; sunbeam breaks with sudden smile. 
 And tomb and bust are touched with life-like ray. 
 O, doth the bright intrusion come to say 
 That morn shall dawn upon the lingering sleep 
 Of mouldering vault beneath, and silent cell, 
 When the last trump shall sound upon the deep, 
 And this old pile be gathered to the heap 
 Of common dust? O, comes it not to tell, 
 With dusky brightness, through the sacred gloom 
 Of that fair beam of life, whose radiance fell 
 Through the pale realms of Death, and, spite of doom. 
 Reversed the fearful sentence of the tomb !
 
 THE END OF TIME, 
 
 A DREAM. 
 
 The crowded Carnival was high, 
 And laughter filled the midnight sky, 
 
 And riot shook the ground : 
 When o'er the tumult fell a cry 
 
 That stilled all other sound. 
 From the paled stars, o'ev song and shout 
 The mirthful din of that gay rout 
 It came — and all stood deadly still. 
 Bereft of motion, thought, and will. 
 As if some terror undefined 
 Had power to paralyze the mind. 
 And glaze the eye, and freeze the blood, 
 And fix each reveller where he stood. 
 Stopped short in mirth^s fantastic tread. 
 Like some pale marble o'er the dead. 
 
 It was a voice right full of dread : 
 Thouo-h far above the sable gloom, —
 
 TJie End of Time. 177 
 
 It smote upon the inmost soul, 
 
 As the last angel's fatal scroll 
 
 — The summons of the day of doom — 
 
 The dreadful writ that breaks the tomb ! 
 
 Each eyeball stood with purpose quelled, 
 
 Its breath each beating bosom held ; 
 
 While from the dark Sublime 
 •That utterance dreadly syllabled — 
 
 "It is the end of Time!" 
 
 Ten thousand smiles were at the birth 
 
 Of frolic, folly, love : 
 Ten thousand purposes of mirth 
 The chain of pleasure wove. 
 No earthquake shook ; no thunder rolled, 
 To palsy hearts so gay and bold, 
 
 In pleasure's reckless mood ; 
 The love-strain had not ceased to thrill, 
 When its last echo from the hill 
 Came like a mockery on that still 
 
 And corse-like multitude ! 
 
 Even in that pause of blank surprise 
 While listening horror fixed all eyes. 
 That dreadful utterance said — 
 
 N
 
 173 The End of Time. 
 
 " Yc shrouded^ from the grave arise- 
 Thou sea, give up thy dead !" 
 
 Then crash on hollow crash came near ; — 
 
 Sounds undefinable — 
 Yet known to superstition^s ear; 
 And who such dull dread tones might hear. 
 Would understand them well! 
 Each awe-struck visage seemed to know 
 The shuddering clatter, long and low. 
 
 Increasing through the gloom. 
 Poured from ten thousand gates below 
 
 The cities of the tomb ! 
 
 While glimmered up in fiend-like play 
 Ten myriad ground-stars of decay, 
 There came a strange yet fearful sight 1 
 The concourse swelled — as gathering cloud-— 
 Till mask and mime stood mixed with shroud, 
 
 In contrast grim and drear. 
 Then knew I well that phantom crowd — 
 
 The dead of time stood there ! 
 They stood in their death-robes — a fearful sight- 
 All wan in that wild and ghastly light !
 
 The Bud of Time. 179 
 
 One long, wild, wailing note of woe 
 Broke forth from all the realms below, 
 And a trumpet-accent cried, " Tis o'er !" 
 'Twas echoed far from sea and shore — 
 The starry concave wildly reeled, 
 And the planetary centre pealed. 
 Low, far down, rolls of hollow thunder 
 That seemed to rock the world asunder. 
 
 A burning twilight far away. 
 
 And fiery wreaths of blood-red day. 
 
 Broke from the hollows near : 
 Its horrors half, no tongue can say- 
 It was a dawn of fear ! 
 Nor may I tell how that deadly light 
 Was swallowed, in primeval night — 
 How surging blackness rose on high. 
 Too broad and deep for mortal eye, 
 
 With shadowing sweep. 
 Unmeasured over earth and sky. 
 
 From the dark waste infinity 
 
 Of Ruin's deep ! 
 
 A momentary stillness came, 
 
 A trance-like horror without name —
 
 ISO The md of Time. 
 
 A rayless, soundless, formless pause 
 Of nature and of nature's laws. 
 
 And all was o^er ! — But late was there 
 
 A splendid city, bright and fair ; 
 
 One moment saw that concourse dread, 
 
 The living mingled with the dead : 
 
 Another — scarce another — lo ! 
 
 The glittering and the ghastly show 
 
 Had vanished like the lightning's gleam. 
 
 Or changes of some frightful dream 
 
 That mocks the brain in fevered sleep — 
 
 And darkness brooded o'er the deep ! 
 
 There was an end to time and place. 
 Alone I lay, self-poised in space, 
 
 A frameless thought. 
 'Twas strange — 'midst changes wild and fast. 
 Fixed by one fear, the spirit sought 
 Through every change one yet more vast, 
 The most tremendous, and the last ! 
 
 Nor vain that fear : through voids unknown, 
 A wide and waveless sea !
 
 The End of Time. 181 
 
 On — fleeting to the eternal throne, 
 
 Across infinity, 
 By some dread instinct far and nigh, 
 — As leaves before chill autumn's sigh 
 
 Collected roll — 
 The spirit world came sweeping by, 
 
 Soul heaped on soul ! 
 Legions, once proud, and brave, and fair, 
 
 Alas ! no bravery was there ! 
 
 Whither they went, I cannot say. 
 
 From the pale train. 
 Once more to greet the blessed day 
 I started — glad to life's dull way 
 
 To wake again.
 
 THE 
 
 COCK-CROW HEAED AT MIDNIGHT. 
 
 BiRi), who thus breakest oa the silence due 
 Of loneliest night with clamour, heard by few 
 Save the all-watchful Hours ; if, in their flight. 
 Thy ghostly trump, most vigilant Chanticleer, 
 They list, and with new fleetness through the night 
 
 Ply their untired career ! 
 In this dread stillness ; the sepulchral hush 
 Of life, and all the host of living things ; 
 Thy lone, far-sounding iteration brings 
 An echo of the awful waves that rush 
 Among the sands of that perfidious shore, 
 We call the Present till our time is o'er : 
 For in the silent intermission shed 
 Between the hours unborn and newly dead. 
 Thou chauntest the past day's requiem, ere the next 
 Efface it from the busy brain of man ;
 
 The Cock- Cr 010 heard at Midmght. 183 
 
 "Who^ by a thousand idle cares perplext, 
 To the brief limit of the vital span 
 Hastes, as the yester-hour which vainly flew. 
 To be forgotten too ! 
 
 Lone voice of darkness ! Eastern legends say 
 
 That vigil note of thine is never still ; 
 
 Heard in the twilight of the matin grey. 
 
 Or when high noon glares on the sultry hill ; 
 
 When winking Hesperus eyelid in the west 
 
 Sheds slumber on each copse and dewy spray ; 
 
 When the late owlet's self is gone to rest. 
 
 And death-like stillness binds each mortal breast. 
 
 Thou still keepest watch, with thy perpetual lay 
 
 Counting the hours of ages — though the sound 
 
 On sleep's unconscious ear doth vainly fall. 
 
 Or in the din of high-orbed noon is drowned ; 
 
 Still ever in each listening interval 
 
 Upon the stillness comes thy constant call. 
 
 From undistinguishable distance bound. 
 
 Like a far-travelling voice of distant years, 
 
 That tells of other times to him the call that hears. 
 
 Swift at that wakeful call the free thought flies, 
 With wing unfettered, o'er the hoary deep
 
 184 The Coch-Crow heard at Midnigid, 
 
 Of immemorial ages : as in sleep. 
 Worlds of the past appear, and shades arise 
 As at the call of some unearthly horn — 
 The conqueror, and the poet, and the sage, 
 Back to the fathers of the world's first age, 
 When that shrill call of thine first woke the morn. 
 — There was no solemn gloom, no sadness, then. 
 
 In that high lay ! 
 To the fresh races of primeval men. 
 Strong in their secular prime, what was a day ! 
 Their sun yet rose with unabated force. 
 Rejoicing as a giant on his course ! 
 In unexhausted glory his fair wave 
 Shed the pure hues of Eden all around 
 The hills and valleys of the virgin ground, 
 A stranger to the plough — scarce conscious of a grave ! 
 
 Yet they passed off, and left no trace behind. 
 
 Not even a tomb ! — As vapour on the wind. 
 
 They were, and were not ! — even their world went by. 
 
 Thy long lone cry 
 Went wildly o^er the waste and watery ball. 
 On which the deluge spread its dreary pall 
 O'er the wide grave of Adam's sons and daughters. 
 From the lone lifeboat on those shoreless waters.
 
 The Cock-Crow heard at Midnight. 185 
 
 But soon again old Time went forth to spin 
 
 His many-coloured web of fleeting life 
 
 With threads of light and darkness — love and strife — 
 
 Peopling the spacious realms of death and sin. 
 
 The mighty tide of days began again, 
 
 And patriarchal men 
 Held the great tenure of the world's estate 
 By title fast as pleader ever penned : 
 
 They yet had end — 
 Leaving brief record, and uncertain date ! 
 And still more glorious times came on ; 
 Names of renown, whose tale hath long been told, 
 Great Nineveh and " that great Babylon j'^ 
 They scaled the heav'n in height ; then one by one 
 Went down the stream of ages, with their pride 
 Borne off, as bubbles of the mighty tide. 
 Or skyborne structures, melting as they go. 
 O, can it be, our Present glideth so ! 
 
 Thro' the still twilight air 
 Does that far watch-cry bid the world prepare 
 To roll to charnel nothingness, and so. 
 Great London, like great Babel, to depart 
 And be a name^no more ? O Bird 1 thy lay. 
 Thus, as of yore, breaking the silence grey. 
 Strikes as time's warning on the lonely heart.
 
 18G Tlie Cock-Croiu heard at Midnight. 
 
 And Fancy sees the stern old phantom stand, 
 Striding the mundane ball with scythe in hand, 
 To sweep all things of mortal birth away ! 
 
 O Bird ! thy strain was in a different mood 
 
 Then in the dawn of one all-glorious day, 
 
 Tho' dark to mortal sense. That morn gleamed grey 
 
 On Pilate's hall — when the Redeemer stood 
 
 To satisfy the strictly righteous law 
 
 Unchangeable, which angels read with awe, 
 
 Far above earthly thought, of perfect good. 
 
 He stood alone — abandoned in that hour 
 
 By earth and heaven to the gravels dread power ; 
 
 But not by his all-righteous fortitude. 
 
 Hell triumphed — earth deserted — heaven forsook — 
 
 Creation stood appalled : ^twas then thy note 
 
 Found a perpetual record, as it smote 
 
 On Peter, like the accusing angel's cry ! 
 
 And, not in anger, but in sorrow turned, 
 
 With mild sad sternness of much- wounded love, 
 
 The heavenly searching eye, touching above 
 
 All earthly fear -, and Peter's bosom burned 
 
 With sense of his unutterable wrong 
 
 To godlike goodness in its hour of sorrow. 
 
 O, could thy clarion shrill one moment borrow
 
 The CocTc-CroiD heard at Midnight. 187 
 
 The iteration of thy ghostly song, 
 
 In that sad hour of fear's extremity ! 
 
 The faithful servant from his master dear, 
 
 For one weak moment, turned in human fear. 
 
 Alas ! how long, and by what sins are we 
 
 Kept loitering, in mere wantonness, aloof — 
 
 Oh ! for a heart of flesh to feel that sad reproof ! 
 
 No trump that ever pealed on human ear 
 
 The loftiest note of victory's proud strain 
 
 On Waterloo or Cressy's glorious plain. 
 
 Was e'er so full of triumph or of fear — 
 
 No sound so big with portent shall be shed 
 
 On mortal ear again, on this low earth. 
 
 To speak the human empire's fall or birth. 
 
 Till the last trumpet shall awake the dead. 
 
 Bursting the sleep of ages — great and small — 
 
 The ransomed, but ungrateful sons of men. 
 
 To meet the eye that looked on Peter then, 
 
 At the third note of that accusing call ; 
 
 But, not as then, in love and mercy deep — 
 
 Oh ! for some call to rouse man from his fatal sleep !
 
 SPRING. 
 
 Fair Spring, if it be thou, 
 O'er yon misty mountain brow. 
 
 In the porch of brightest dawn, dost appear, 
 With that scarf of every hue, 
 With that zone of pearly dew, 
 With thy freshness ever new, 
 
 O come here ! 
 
 From thy morning's eastern cave. 
 Thy gay bowers beyond the wave, 
 
 Where Araby's blest sunbeam smiles ; 
 From the fragrant Indian steep, 
 Stretch thy light vans o'er the deep. 
 And drive those hours that weep 
 
 O'er the isles.
 
 Spring. 1S9 
 
 Call each bright and gentle thing 
 That comes with thee, O Spring, 
 
 To gladden every lawn and glade ; 
 The breeze and shower, the beam 
 That tinges cloud and stream. 
 Or plays where blue-bells gleam. 
 
 In the shade. 
 
 By the fountain's fairy billow. 
 New silver the sad willow 
 
 That droops its mournful braid o'er the pool ; 
 Scatter thyme and tufted reed 
 O'er the lilied lowland mead. 
 Where the sedgy streamlets speed. 
 
 Clear and cool. 
 
 Bring each gem of heavenly hue, 
 Each child of sun and dew. 
 
 Which moor, or mount, or meadow knows ; 
 All the wild flowers sweet that twine 
 In that sunny wreath of thine. 
 The cowslip, eglantine. 
 
 And red rose.
 
 190 Spring. 
 
 Bring the painted wings that hover 
 On thy banks of honied clover, 
 
 And the murmur of busy bees ; 
 And, as thy train advances. 
 The myriad maze that dances, 
 Where the arrowy swallow glances 
 
 In the breeze. 
 
 Bid new life be of thy train, 
 And young bleatings fill the plain 
 
 Till the shepherd^s heart rejoice ; 
 Bid thy thrush call up the grove. 
 And thy cushat murmur love, 
 And thy lark in heaven above 
 
 Find a voice. 
 
 But chief, O soul of flowers. 
 And heart-enlivening hours. 
 
 The muse, and queen of love, wait for thee, 
 The nurse of hope thou art : 
 When thy sunbeams touch the heart, 
 Love and gladness they impart. 
 
 And young glee.
 
 Spring. 191 
 
 Then hither — hither. Spring, 
 Wave thy fragrant sunny wing 
 
 In the breezes of flowery May ; 
 Bring thy passion-haunted maze. 
 And thy choir of woodland lays. 
 For thee the world delays. 
 
 Come away ! '^ 
 
 » 
 
 * DuUin Penny Journal.
 
 THE PASSING BELL. 
 
 With its measured pause, and its long-drawn wail, ,' 
 
 The minster bell swings on the gale, 
 
 And saddens the vale with its solemn toll — 
 
 That passeth away like a passing soul — 
 
 Pulse after pulse still diminishing on. 
 
 Till another rings forth for the dead and gone. 
 
 The minute-sound of that mourning bell 
 Is the lord^s of the valley — the rich man^s knell ; 
 While it swells on his lawns and his woodlands bright, 
 He breathes not, hears not, nor sees the light ; 
 On the couch of his ease he lies stiff and wan — 
 In the midst of his pomp he is dead and gone. 
 The pride hath passed from his haughty brow — 
 Where are his plans and his projects now ? 
 Another lord in his state is crowned, 
 To level his castles with the ground !
 
 Tlie Passing Bell. 193 
 
 Respect and terror pass reckless on — 
 His frowns and favours are dead and ffone. 
 
 Had he wisdom, and wealth, and fame, 
 Mortal tonof-ue shall foro^et his name : 
 Other hands shall disperse his store — 
 Earthly dream shall he drenm no more : 
 His chair is vacant— his way lies on 
 To the formless cells of the dead and gone. 
 
 Passing bell, that does sadly fling 
 
 Thy wailing wave on the air of spring, 
 
 There is no voice in thy long wild moan, 
 
 To tell where the parted soul is flown. 
 
 To what far mansion it travels on, 
 
 While thou tollest thus for the dead and gone. 
 
 Yet, bell of death, on the living air 
 
 Thy notes come bound from the house of prayer — 
 
 They speak of the valley of shadow, trod 
 
 On a path once walked by the Sou of God, 
 
 Whose word of promise inviteth on, 
 
 Through the gate unclosed for the dead and gone.* 
 
 * Dublin Penny Journal.
 
 TO KATHARINE. 
 
 Believe not I forget thee : not for one 
 
 Dark moment has my breast been so abandoned 
 
 By that fixed consciousness, that with its life 
 
 So long hath been as one. Away from thee, 
 
 My heart is self-divided, ever seeking 
 
 The loadstar of its plighted faith; unchanged 
 
 By time or distance : and my steps forlorn, 
 
 Whether they move in sunshine or in gloom. 
 
 Are weary ever till they turn to thee. 
 
 Through every scene companion of my way. 
 
 In thee all cares find rest, all sorrows soothing — 
 
 For thee all joys are treasured up untasted. 
 
 As scattered sweets which the home-loving: bee 
 
 Hoards for its mossy dwelling far away.
 
 LINES 
 
 WRITTEN ON THE DEATH OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. 
 
 All that of Scott may die, is dead : 
 
 The minstrel sleeps. 
 And yet upon his clay-cold bed 
 
 A nation weeps. 
 But long the fame he left shall fill 
 
 The world^s broad eye — 
 A star for ever bright and still, 
 
 That cannot die ! 
 
 For him no storied pile need give 
 
 Perennial fame : 
 Go — seek the stone that can outlive 
 
 The poet's name !
 
 196 On the Death of Sir Walter Scott. 
 
 The tomb inscribed with conquests won- 
 
 The pride of kings. 
 The proudest pile beneath the sun, 
 
 Are passing things ! 
 
 There needs no scroll, no cumbering stone 
 
 With wasted art. 
 To say where Scott hath raised his throne- 
 
 The human heart I 
 No blood-stained pillar dates his hour 
 
 With trophied crime ; 
 But Nature^s self attests his power 
 
 To glad all time ! 
 
 More true than the enchanted sphere, 
 
 Agrippa's glass; 
 He brought the past and distant near. 
 
 Not so to pass ; 
 For, as the mightier master drew — 
 
 Upon his sight 
 The world of ages rose, in true 
 
 And living light !
 
 On the Death of Sir Walter Scott. 197 
 
 O, in what dull oblivious a^ije 
 
 Shall man forget, 
 To glow and wonder o'er the page 
 
 Our tears now wet ? 
 When shall that grave he common clay ? 
 
 Or Ruin dare 
 At furthest time to cast his grey 
 
 Oblivion there ? 
 
 When feeling, fancy, wit shall sleep 
 
 In mindless gloom. 
 Then dull forgetfulness may creep 
 
 Around his tomb ! 
 Then, may the pilgrim step forego 
 
 That honoured shrine : 
 Then weeds on Dryburgh's tomb may grow. 
 
 And, Avon, thine !
 
 PREPARING FOR PUBLICATION. 
 
 BT THE SAME AUTHOR. 
 
 I. 
 
 DOMITIAN. 
 
 A ROMAN TRAGIC DRAMA. 
 
 II. 
 
 THE CAVERN. 
 
 AN ENGLISH HISTORIC TRAGEDY, 
 
 III. 
 
 LONDON. 
 
 A POEM IN SIX BOOKS. 
 
 IV. 
 
 THE UNIVERSE. 
 
 WITH ITS TRUE HISTORY
 
 JOHN CAMDEN HOTTEN'S PUBLICATIONS. 
 
 ♦ 
 
 ATTRACTIVE NEW BOOKS. 
 
 NEW BOOK BY THE "ENGLISH GUSTAVE DORE."— COMPANION TO THE 
 
 " HATCHET THROWERS." 
 This day, 4to, Illustrations, coloured, 7s. &d, ; plain, 5s. 
 
 r EGSNDS OF SAVAGE LIFE. By James Greenwood, the famous 
 
 -a— i Author of "A Night in a Workhouse." With S6 inimitably droll Illustrations 
 drawn and coloured by Eunest Griset, the " English Gustavo Dore." 
 
 " Readers who found amusement in the ' Hatchet Throwers' will not regret any 
 acquaintance they may form with this comical work. The laictures are among the most 
 surprising which have come from this ailist's pencil." 
 
 COMPANION VOLUME TO "LEECH'S PICTURES." 
 
 This day, oblong 4to, a handsome volume, half-morocco, price 12»\ 
 
 SEYMOUR'S SKETCHES. The Book of Cockney Sports, Whims, 
 
 ^J and Oddities. Nearly 200 highly amusing Illustrations. 
 
 *«* A reissue of the famous pictorial comicalities which were so popular thirty years 
 ago. The volume is admii-ably adapted for a table-book, and the pictures will doubtless 
 again meet with that popularity which was extended towards them when the artist pro- 
 jected with Mr. Dickens the famous " Pickwick Papers." 
 
 "Will be the most popular of all the Amusing Boobs issued this Year." 
 
 "AN AWFULLY JOLLY BOOK" FOR PARTIES. 
 
 This day, on toned paper, printed by Clay, 7s. Qd. 
 
 PUNIANA ; or, Thoughts Wise and Other- wise. The best Book 
 of Riddles and Puns ever formed. Collected and edited by the Hon. HUGH ROWLET. 
 With nearly 100 exquisitely fanciful Drawings. In beautiful cloth binding, gilt edges, 
 with Picture by Gustavo Dore, printed in colours, and inlaid in cover. 
 
 " It contains nearly 3000 of the best Riddles, and about twice that number of the most 
 outrageous Puns," and it is believed will prove to be " the most popular of all the Christmas 
 books issued this year." 
 
 A THIRD EDITION, price 7s. U., of 
 
 XJISTOKY OP SIGN-BOARDS. 
 
 From the Times review of three columns. 
 " It is not fair on the part of a reviewer to pick the plums out of an author's book, 
 thus filching away his cream, and leaving little but skim milk remaining ; but, even if we 
 were ever so maliciously inclined, wc cuuld not, in the present instance, pick out all 
 jvfessrs. Larwood and Ilotten's plums, because the good things are so numerous as to 
 defy the most wholesale depredation." 
 
 THE NEW AND VERY POPULAR EDITION OF 
 
 WAVERLEY NOVELS. In crown 8vo, 200 pages, price 6d. each. 
 
 ^ ^ GUY tIAHKKRING. IVANHOE. THE ANTIQUARY. 
 
 Also, THIRD EDITIONS of 
 
 ROB ROY. KENILWORTH. THE PIRATE. 
 
 WAVEKLEY. OLD MORTALITY. THE MONASTERY. 
 
 •,• Where any difficulty occurs u\ tlic sipply, postage stamps may be rcmiited direct to Uie under- 
 tinned, who will for-^ard per return. The name of the Publisher MUST IN ALL CASES bo given. 
 
 t,..., ^'.. ....... Jl,.^n-,-.' Ii .1 I ,.L.^ lA ,. „,/ 71". /','...■ .,/;// ,; I ..^,,/,^n
 
 A TTRA CTl YE NE^V BOOKS. 
 
 MR. SWINBURNE'S "POEMS AND BALLADS." 
 
 NOTICE. — The pnhlislier hecjs to inform the very manij j)crsons who have 
 inquired after this remarkable Work that copies may now be obtained at all Booksellers, 
 price ds. 
 
 MR. SWINBURNES NOTES on his POEMS and on the REVIEWS 
 which have appeared upon them, is now ready, price Is. 
 
 ATALANTA IN CALYDON. By Algernon Charles Swinburne. 6s. 
 
 CIIASTELARD : a Tragedy. By A. C. Swinburne. 7s. 
 
 ESSAYS on BLAKE, the ARTIST. (In preparation.) 
 
 ROSSETTrS CRITICISM on SWINBURNE'S " POEMS." 3s. Cd. 
 
 THE MOST APPROPRIATE CHRISTIAN GIFT-BOOK. 
 This daj', in small 4to, with very beaiitlM floriated borders, ia the Renaissaace style. 
 
 CONGS OF THE NATIVITY. An entirely new collection of 
 O Christian Carols, including some never before given in any collection. With Music 
 to the more popular. Edited by W. H. Husk, Librarian to the Sacred Harmonic Society. 
 In charmingly aj^propriate cloth, gilt, and admirably adapted for binding in antique calf 
 or morocco, V2s. Qd. 
 
 Tlie following Book is sure to become a widely popular one. 
 
 "IT DOES FOR WINCHESTER WHAT 'TOM BROWN' DID FOR RUGBY." 
 
 This day, crown 8vo, handsomely printed, Is. Qd. 
 
 e CHOOL LIFE AT WINCHESTER ; or, The Reminiscences 
 
 O of a Winchester Junior. By the Author of the ''Log of the Water Lily." With 
 numerous Illustrations, exquisitely coloured after the original drawings. 
 
 NEW BOOK OF POPULAR HUMOUR. 
 This day, crown 8vo, handsomely printed, toned paper, 3^. Qd. 
 
 WIT AND HUMOUR: Poems by the " Autocrat of the Breakfast- 
 V » Table." " A volume of delightfully humorous poems, very similar to the mirthful 
 verses of Tom Hood. Readers will not be disappointed with this work." 
 
 ANGLICAN CHURCH ORNAMENTS. 
 This day, thick 8vo, with Illustrations, price 15^. 
 
 XPNGLISH CHURCH FURNITURE, ORNAMENTS, and 
 
 J-Li DECORATIONS, at the Period of the Reformation. Edited by Ed. Peacock, 
 
 F.S.A. 
 
 " Very ciu-ious as showing what articles of church furniture were in those days con- 
 sidered to bo idolatrous or unnecessary. The work, of which only a limited number has 
 been printed, is of the highest interest to those who take part in the present Ritual dis- 
 cussion." — See Reviews in the Religious Jouriials. 
 
 *«* Where any difficulty occurs in the supply, postage stamps may be remitted direct to the under- 
 •igned, who -wnll forward per return. The name of the Publisher MT7ST IN ALL CASES be givMU 
 
 John Camden Hotxen, ruUishir, 7i and 75, Piccadillg, London.
 
 HUMOROUS A]S'D AMUSIXG BOOKS WORTH HAVING. 
 
 {See SATURDAY REVIEW, October 29.) 
 
 HOTTEK'S AUTHORIZED ONLY COMPLETE EDITIONS. 
 This day, on toned paper, price Crf. ; by post, 7(1. 
 
 Hotten's New Book of Humour. 'Aitemus Ward Among the Fenians: 
 
 with the Showman's Experiences of Life at V^asliiugton, and Militai-y Ardour at BaldiusvUie. 
 
 'ARTEsrus Ward on the Fesians.— Tlie ridiculous proceedings of the Fenians, with their "circles" 
 and "centres," have just been described by Artemis Ward in a very droll "report" of one of their meetings, 
 at which he is supposed to have presided. The httlo volume, irndtr the title of " Artemus Ward among the 
 Fenians," will be pubUshed here at once. The author is expected to arrive at Liverpool by the City of Boston 
 this week.'— Staxdabd. 
 
 This day, 4th edition, on tinted paper, bound in cloth, neat, price 3s. 6d. ; by post, 3s. lOd. 
 
 Hotten's 'Artemus Ward: His Book.' The Author's Enlarged Edition: 
 
 containing, in addition to the following edition, two extra chapters, entitled 'The Draft in 
 Baldinsville. with Mr. Ward's Private Opinion concerning Old Bachelors,' and 'Mr. W.'s Visit to 
 a Graflick ' [Soiree]. 
 
 ' We never, not even in the pages of our best hiunorists, read anything so laughable and so shrewd as we 
 have seen in this book by the nihthf ul Artemus.'— Public Oplnion. 
 
 New edition, this day, price Is. ; by post, Is. 2d. 
 
 Hotten's 'Artemus Ward: His Book.' Edited, -w^ith Notes and Intro- 
 duction, by the Editor of the 'Biglow Papers.' One of the wittiest and certainly the most mirth- 
 provoking book published for many years. Containing the whole of the Original, with the 
 foUowing extra chapters : Babesin the Wood; Tavern Accommodation ; Betsy- Jain-Pe-Orgunized ; 
 A. Ward's First Umbrella; Brigham Young's Wives; Artemus Ward's Brother; Mormon Bill of 
 Fare. 
 Notice. — ICr. Hotten's Edition is the only one published in tins country with the sanction of the author. 
 
 Every copy contains A Ward's signature. The 'Saturday Review' of October 21st says of Mr. Hotten's 
 
 edition : ' The author combines the powers of Thackeray with those of Albert Smith. The salt is rubbed in 
 
 by a native hand— one whirti has the gift of tickling.' 
 
 ENTIRELY NEW BOOK BY ARTEMUS WARD. 
 This day, crown 8vo., toned paper, cloth, price 3s. 6d. ; by post, 3s. lOd. 
 
 Hotten's 'Artemus Ward: His Travels Among the Mormons and on the 
 
 P^ampage.' Edited by E. P. Hingston, the Agent and Companion of A. Ward whilst 'on the 
 Rampage.' 
 
 Notice. — Readers of Artemus Ward's droll books are informed that an Illustrated Edition of Hli3 
 Travels is now ready, containing numerous Comic Pictures, representing the different scenes and events 
 ill Artemus Ward's adventures. 
 
 This day, cheap edition, in neat wrapper, price Is. 
 
 Hotten's 'Artemus Ward: His Travels Among the Mormons.' The Ne-w 
 
 Shilling Edition, with Ticket of Admission to Mormon Lecture. 
 
 Eightieth Thousand, beautifully printed, 12mo., price Is. ; by post. Is. 2d. 
 THE CHOICEST HUMOROUS POETRY OF THE AGE. 
 
 Hotten's ' Biglo-w Papers.' By James Russell Lo-well. 
 
 This edition has been edited, with additional Notes explanatory of the persons and subjects mentioned 
 therein, and is the only complete and correct edition pubhshed in this country. 
 ' The celebrated " Biglow Papers." '—Times, July 25th. 
 
 Biglow Papers. Another Edition, with Coloured Plates by George 
 
 Cruik.shank, bound in cloth, neat, price 3«. Cd. 
 
 Handsomely printed, square 12mo. 
 
 Advice to Parties About to Marry. A Series of Instructions in Jest 
 
 and Earnest. By the Honourable Hugu Rowlev, and illustrated with numerous comic design.s 
 from his penciL 
 
 *.' Where any difficulty occur* in the supply, postage stamps may be remitted direct to the under- 
 •igaed; who will forward per retian. The name of the Publisher MUST IN ALL CASES be given. 
 
 JouN Camden IIotten. Publisher, 74 and 75. Pkcadillv. Z^'^on.
 
 HUMOROUS AND AMUSIXG BOOKS WORTH HAVING. 
 
 {See SATURDAY KEVIE^V, October 29.) 
 In one vol., exquisitely printed from silver-faced type, price 4s. 6d. 
 
 ;iioicest Jests of Eiiglisli Wits ; from the Rude Jokes of Ancient Jesters 
 
 to the refined and impromptu Witticisms of Theodore Hook and Doughis .Terrold; includinfi the 
 cream of Joe Miller: compri.sing the best sayings, facetious and merry, wliicli have contributed 
 to give to our country the name of Merry England. Edited by W. Moy Thomas, Esq. 
 
 Note.— This worlt haa iK-en in preparation since 1S5S. Kcarly 500 curious old Jest Hooks and collections of 
 iimous Witticisms are under examination for materials. It is believed tliat no siuiilar conipUation issued 
 ince the days v.hen Jack Mottley compiled the Uooli of Jests usually attributed to ' Joe Miller' w-ill be found 
 excel the above for true wit and retiued humour. 
 
 Uniform with the above, exquisitely printed, 
 
 ilie Choicest Humorous Anecdotes and Short Stories in the English 
 
 Language. 
 
 Uniform with the above, exqui.?itely printed, 
 
 Che Choicest Epigrams in the English Language. 
 
 Uniform with the above, exquisitely printed, 
 
 [he Choicest Humorous Poetry in the English Language. 
 
 — . -ii.4b-. ■ - . ■ ■ - 
 
 AN EXTRAORDINARY BOOK. 
 Beautifully printed, thick Svo., new, half morocco, Roxburghe, I2s. 6cl. 
 
 [lotten's Edition of 'Contes Drolatiques' (Droll Tales collected from the 
 
 Abbeys of Loraine). Par Balzac. With Four Hundred and Twenty-five Marvellous, Extrava- 
 gant, and Fantastic Woodcuts, by Gustave Dobe. 
 The most singiUar designs ever attempted by any artist. This liook is a fund of amusement. So cranmied 
 s it with pictures that even the contents ai'C adorned with thirty-three illustrations. Direct application must 
 je made to Mr. Hotten for this work. *= 
 
 THE ORIGINAL EDITION OF JOE MILLER'S JESTS. 1739. 
 
 Joe Miller's Jests; or, the Wit's Vade Mecum; a Collection of the most 
 
 brilliant Jests, politest Repartees, most elegant Bons Mots, and most pleasant short Stories in the 
 English Language. An interesting specimen of remarkable facsimile, Svo., half morocco, price 
 9s. (Sd. London : printed by T. Read, 1739. 
 
 Only a very few copies of this humorous book have been rsproduced. 
 
 NEW BOOK OP IRRESISTIBLE HUMOUR. 
 This day, handsomely printed on toned paper, price 3s. 6d. 
 
 Hotten's 'Josh Billings: His Book of Sayings;' with Introduction by 
 
 E. P. HiNQSTON, companion of Artemus Ward when on his 'Travels.' 
 
 For many years past the sayings and comicaUties of 'Josh Billings' have leen quoted in our newspapers. 
 His humour is of a quieter kind, more aphoristically comic, than the fun and drollery of the 'delicioua 
 Artemus,' as Charles Reade styles the Showman. If Artemus Ward may be called the comic story teller of 
 his time. ' Josii' can certainly he dubbed the comic essayist of his day. Althoush promised some time ago, 
 iVIr. BiUings' 'Book' has only just appeared, but it contains all his best and most mirth-provoking articles. 
 
 This day, in three vols., crown Svo., cloth, neat, 
 
 Orpheus C. Kerr Papers. The Original American Edition, in Three 
 
 Series, complete. Three vols., Svo., cloth, sells at £1 2s. 6d., now specially offered at 15s. 
 
 A most mirth-provoking work. It Vvas first introduced into tliis comitry by the English officers who werg 
 quartered during the late war on the Canadian fronti-.r. They ffnmd it one of the drollest pieces of composi- 
 tion they had ever met with, and so brought copies over for the delectation of thek friends. 
 
 Abridgment of ' Orpheus C. Kerb,' price Is. 
 
 Notice.— Mr. Hotten (Artemus Ward's Publisher in this Country) has 
 
 just issued another Book of re.-l Wit and Humour, ORPHEUS C. KERR (office-seeker) PAPERS. 
 The price is Is., and readers of Mr. Hotten's edition of the 'Biglow Papers' and 'Artemus Ward' 
 will not regret any acquaintance they may form with ' Orpheus C. Kerr.' 
 
 *,.* Where any difficulty occtirs in the supply, postage stamps may be remitted direct to the under- 
 signed, who will forward per return. The name of the Publisher MUST IN ALL CASES be gives. 
 
 John Camden Hotten, Publisher, 74 cmd 75, PiccadiUy, London.
 
 HCJIOROUS AXD A3IUSIXG BOOKS WORTH HAYIXG. 
 
 {See SATURDAY REVIEW, October 29.) 
 In one vol., choicely printed, 
 
 Piccadilly Eiddle Book : an entirely New Collection of the best Puns, 
 
 Conundrums, and other 'Small Talk.' Gathered together by the Honourable Hugh Kowley, 
 and illustrated by nearly One Hundred Comic Designs from his pencil. 
 
 Preparing, in 4to., exquisitely printed on ivory paper, 
 
 Puck on Pegasus. Entirely New Edition, greatly enlarged, with 
 
 additional illustrations by Noel Paton, Millais, John Tenniel, Eichard Doyi.e, M. Elles 
 Edwards, and other distinguished artists. 
 
 THACKERAY AND GEORGE CRUIKSHANK. 
 In small Svo., cloth, very neat, price 4.'!. Gd. 
 
 Thackeray's Humour. Illustrated by the Pencil of George Cruikshank. 
 
 Twenty-four Humorous Designs executed by this inimitable artist in the years 1839-40, as illus- 
 trations to ' Tjie Fatal Boots' and ' The Diahy of Babbeii Cox,' with letterpress descriptions 
 suggested by the late Mr. Thackeray. 
 
 THE ENGLISH GUSTAVE DORE. 
 This day, in 4to., handsomely printed, cloth gilt, price 7s. Gd. ; with plates uncoloured. 5». 
 
 The Hatchet Throwers; with Thirty-six Illustrations, colovired after the 
 
 Inimitably Grotesque Drawings of Ernest Griset. 
 
 Comprises the astonisliing adventures of Three Ancient Mariners, the Brothers Brass of Bristol, Mr. 
 Corker, and Mungo Midge. 
 
 'A Munchausen sort of book. The drawings by M. Griset are very powerful and eccentric.'— Saturday 
 Eeview. 
 
 This day, in crown Svo., uniform with 'Biglow Papers,' price 3s. Gd. 
 
 Wit and Humour. By the ' Autocrat of the Breakfast Table.' A volume 
 
 of delightfully humoroiis Poems, very similar to the mirthful verses of Tom Hood. Readers will 
 not be disappointed with this work. 
 
 Cheap edition, handsomely printed, price Is. 
 
 Vera Vereker; a Comic Story, by Thomas Hood, with Punning Illustra- 
 
 TIONS by V,'ll,LIAJ>[ ijRUNTON. 
 
 One of the most amusing volumes which have been published for a long time. For a piece of broad 
 humour, of the highly-seiLsational kind, it is perhaps the best piece of literary fun by ToM Hood. 
 
 In 1 vol., Svo., handsomely printed, 
 
 A Pedlar's Wallet. By Dudley Costello. With Illustrations. 
 
 Immediately, at all the Libraries, 
 
 Cent, per Cent.: a Story wi'itten upon a Bill Stamp. By Blanchard 
 
 Jerkold. With numerous coloured illustrations in the style of the late Mr. Leech's charming 
 designs. 
 A Story of 'Tlie Vampires of London,' as they were pithily termed in a recent notorious case, and one at 
 andoubted interest. 
 
 AN ENTIRELY NEW BOOK OF DELIGHTFUL FAIRY TALES. 
 
 Now ready, square 12mo., handsomely printed on toned paper, in cloth, green and goi4, 
 
 price 4s. Gd. jilain, 5s. Gd. coloured (by post Gd. extra). 
 
 Family Fairy Talcs ; or. Glimpses of Eliland at Heatherston Hall. Edited 
 
 by Ciioi.MONDKr.KY PK^.■^l;LL, Authorof 'Puck on Pegasus,' &c., adorned with beautiful pictures 
 of ' My Lord Lion,' ' King Uggermuggcr,' and other great folks. 
 This charming volume of Original Tales has been mu7ersally praised by the critical press. 
 
 Pansie : a Child Stoiy, the Last Literary Effort of Nathaniel Hawthorne. 
 
 12mo. , price Gd. 
 
 Rip Van Winkle ; and the ' Story of Sleepy Hollow.' By Washington 
 
 Ievino. Foolscap 8vo., very neatly printed on toned paper, illustrated cover, Gd. 
 *»* Where any diJiioulty occurs in the supply, postage stamps may be rcmittctl direct to the under- 
 
 • {<mp;1 •=/>,« mill fnyar^-A no.- »ofii.-n TVio notno nf tVlo PllViliolini- IVTTTRT FNT AT.T. (lASES hft O^VBn.
 
 BOOKS OF HISTORY, BIOGRAPHY, <&c., WORTH HAVING. 
 
 [See THE TIMES, January 22.) 
 
 Anecdotes of the Green Room and Stage; or, Leaves from an Actor's 
 
 Note-Book, at Home and Abroad. By George Vandenuoff. Post 8vo., pp. 3.30, price 2s. 
 
 Includes original anecdotes of the Keans (father and son), the two Kembles, Macrcady, Cooke, Liston, 
 Farren, Elliston. Brab.ani and his Sons, Plielps, Buckstone. Webster, Charles jlattlivvvs, Siddons, Vestris, 
 Helen Faucit, Mrs, Nisbct, Miss Cushman, Miss O'Ncil, Mrs. Glover, Mrs. Charles Kean, llachel, Ilistori, 
 and many other ilramatic celebrities. 
 
 Berjeau's (P. C.) Book of Dogs; the Varieties of Dogs as they are found 
 
 in Old Sculptures, Pictures, Engravings, and Books. 1SG5. Half morocco, the sides richly 
 lettered with gold, 7s. <Jd. 
 
 In this very interesting volume are 52 plates, facsimiled from rare old Engravings, Paintings, Sculptures, 
 &c., in which may be traced over 100 varieties of dogs known to the ancients. 
 
 This day, elegantly isrinted, pp. 9(>, wrapper Is., cloth 2s., post free, 
 
 Carlyle on the Choice of Books. The Inaugural Address of Thomas 
 
 Carlyle, with Memoir, Anecdotes, Two Portraits, and View of his House in Chelsea. 
 The ' Address ' is reprinted from ' The Times,' carefully compared with twelve other reports, and ia 
 believed to be the most accurate yet printed. 
 
 The leader in the ' Dady Telegraph,' April 25th, largely quotes from the above ' Memoir.' 
 
 In foolscap Svo , cloth, price 3s. 6d., beautifully printed, 
 
 Gog and Magog; or, the History of the Guildhall Giants. With some 
 
 Account of the Giants which guard English and Continental Cities. By F. W. Fairholt, F.S. A. 
 With illustrations on wood by the author, coloured and plain. 
 
 The critiques which have appeared upon this amusing little work have been uniformly favourable. The 
 'Art-Journal' says, in a long article, that it thoroughly explains who tliese old giants were, the position they 
 occupied in pnpidar mj-tliology, the origin of Uieir names, and a score of other matters, all of much interest 
 in throwing a lit;ht upon fabulous portions of om' history. 
 
 Now ready, handsomely printed, jirice Is. Gd., 
 
 Hints on Hats ; adapted to the Heads of the People. By Henry Melton, 
 
 of Regent Street. With curious woodcuts of the various style of Hats worn at different periods 
 
 Anecdotes of eminent and fashionable personages are given, and a fund of interesting information relative 
 the History of Costume and change of tastes may be found scattered tlurough its pages. 
 
 This day, handsomely bound, pp. 550, price 7s. 6d., 
 
 History of Playing Cards; with Anecdotes of their Use in Ancient and 
 
 Modern Games, Conjuring, Fortune-Telling, and CARD-SHARriNO. With Sixty curious 
 illustrations on toned paper. Skill and Sleight of Ha'.id ; Gambling and Calculation ; Cartomancy 
 and Cheating; Old Games and Gaming-Houses : Card Eevels and Blind Hookey; Piquet and 
 Vingt-et-un ; Whist and Cribbage ; Old-Fashioned Tricks. 
 A highly-interesting vohune.' — Morning Post. 
 
 This day, Svo., pp. COO, handsomely printed. 
 
 The History of Signboards, from the Earliest Times to the Present Day ; 
 
 with Anecdotes of Famous Taverns and Eemarkable Characters. By Jacob Larvvood and John 
 Camden Hotten. The volume has been divided into the following sections : General History of 
 Signboards; Historic and Commemorative Signs; Heraldic and Emblematic; Animals and 
 Monsters ; Birds and Fowls ; Fishes and Insects ; Flowers, Trees, Herbs, &c. ; Biblical and 
 Religious ; Saints, Martyrs, *c. ; Dignities, Trades, and Profe.ssions ; the House and the Table : 
 Dress, Plain and Ornamental; Geograjihy and Topography; Humorous and Comic; Puns and 
 Rebuses ; Miscellaneous Signs ; Bonnell 'Thornton's Signboard Exhibition. 
 
 Nearly 100 most curious illustrations on wood are given, showing the various old signs which were forinevly 
 lung from taverns and other houses. The frontispiece represents the famous sign of ' The Man loaded wiJi 
 Mischief,' in the colours of the original painting said to have been executed by Hogarth. 
 
 *,* Where any difficulty occurs in the supply, postage stamps may be remitted direct to the under- 
 ligned, who -will forward per return. The name of the Publisher MT7ST IN ALL CASES be given, 
 
 John Camden Hotten, PuhUsher, 74 and 75, Piccadilly, London.
 
 BOOKS OF HISTORY, BIOGRAPHY, &c., WORTH HAVING. 
 
 {See THE TIMES, January 22.) 
 Pp. 336, handsomely printed, cloth extra, price 3s. Cd. , 
 
 Holidays with Hobgoblins; or, Talk of Strange Things. By Dudley 
 
 CosTKLLO. With humorous engravings by George CRriKsn.\NK. Amongst the chapters may 
 be enumerated : Shaving a Ghost ; Superstitions and Traditions ; Monsters ; the Ghost of Pit 
 Pond ; the AVatcher of the Dead ; the Haunted House near Hampstead ; Dragons, Gritiins, and 
 Salamanders; Alchemy and Gunpowder; Mother Shipton; Bird History; Witchcraft and Old 
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 SUPPLEMENTARY VOLUME TO HONE'S WORKS. 
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 Hone's Scrap Book. A Supplementaiy Volume to the ' Every-Day Book,' 
 
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 upwards of One Hundred and Fifty engravings of curious or eccentric objects. 
 
 BAENUM'S NEW BOOK. 
 
 Humbugs of the World. By P. T. Barnum. Pp. 320, crown 8vo., cloth 
 
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 'A most vivacious book, and a very readable one.' — Globe. 
 ' The history of Old Adams and his grisly bears is inimitable.'— Athen>eum. 
 
 •A History o£ Humbugs by the Prince of Humbugs ! What book can be more promising?'— Saturday 
 Eetizw. 
 
 This day, new edition, with numerous illustrations. 
 
 Log of the 'Water Lily' (Thames Gig), during Two Cruises in the 
 
 Summers of 1S51-52, on the Rhine, Neckar, Main, Moselle, Danube, and other Streams of Ger- 
 many. By R. B. Mansfield, B. A. , of University College, Oxford, and illustrated by Alfred 
 Thompson, B.A., of Trinity College, Cambridge. 
 
 This was the earhest boat excursion of the kind ever made on the Continental rivers. Very recently the 
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 be foimd most interestiug to those who propose taking a similar trip, whether on the Continent or elsewhere. 
 
 This day, in two vols., 8vo., very handsomely printed, price 16s., 
 THE HOUSEHOLD STORIES OF ENGLAND. 
 
 Popular Romances of the West of England ; or, the Drolls of Old Corn- 
 
 waU. Collected and edited by Robert Hunt, F.R.S. 
 
 For an analysis of this important work see printed description, which may be obtained gratis at the 
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 Many of the stories are remarkable for their wild poetic beauty; others surprise us by their quaintne.=B; 
 whilst others, again, show forth a tragic force which can only be associated with those rude ages which 
 existed long before tlie period of authentic history. 
 
 Mr. George Cruikshank has snpphed two wonderful pictures as illustrations to the work. One is a portrait 
 of Giant Bolster, a personage twelve miles high. 
 
 Robson; a Sketch, by Augustus Sala. An Interesting Biography, with 
 
 Sketches of his famous characters, 'Jem Baggs,' 'Boots at the Swan,' 'The Yellow Dwarf,' 
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 This day, post Svo., with numerous illustrations. 
 
 School Life at Winchester College ; or, the Reminiscences of a Winchester 
 
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 This book does for Winchester what ' Tom Brown's School Days' did for Rugby — explains tho evcry-day life, 
 
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 his day, 4Smo., beautifully printed from silver-faced tyiJo, cloth, very neat, gilt edges, price 2s. 6d., 
 
 moker's Text Book. By J. Hamer, F.R.S.L. This exquisite little volume 
 
 compri.ses the most important passages from the works of eminent men written in favour of the 
 much-abused weed. Its compilation was suggested by a remark made by Sir Uulwer Lytton :— 
 
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 A NEW BOOK BY THE LATE MR. THACKERAY. 
 
 Tie Students' Quarter; or, Paris Life Five-aud-Twenty Yera-s Since. 
 
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 NEW EDITION OF MR. EMANUEL'S IMPORTANT WORK 
 
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 Diamonds and Precious Stones: their History, Value, and Properties, 
 
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 How to See Scotland; or, a Fortnight in the Higiilands for £6. 
 
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 Now ready, Svo., price Is., 
 
 List of British Plants. Compiled and Arrang-ed by Alex. SEore, F.L.S. 
 
 This comparative Liii of British Plants was drawn up for the use of the country botainst, to show the differ- 
 ences ui (.ipiniou which exist between different authors as to the nuiaberof species which ought to be reckoned 
 within the compaig of the Flora of Great Britain. 
 
 This day, neatly printed, price 1». Gd. ; by post Is. Sd, 
 
 Mental Exertion: Its Infiueiice on Health. By Dr. Brigham. Edited, 
 
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 The recent untimely deaths of Admiral Fit Toy and Mr. Prescott, whose minds gave way under excessive 
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 Now ready, 2nd edition, in binding ornamented with postage stamps, price Is. ; by post Is. Id., 
 
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 ZS" Tills Second Ewtion gitcs vpwards of 300 Stam2^s not in the pmiovs issue. 
 
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 In 1 vol., with 300 Drawings from Nature, 28. 6d. plain, 4s. Crf. coloured by hand, 
 
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 and Phrases peculiar to the Six great Educational Establishments of the country. — Preparing. 
 
 Dictionary of Colloquial English; the "Words and Phrases in current 
 
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 Now ready, price 2s. 6c?. ; by post 23. lOd., 
 
 Dictionary of the Oldest Words in the English Language, from the Semi- 
 
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 in the printed English Literature of the 13th Century, by the late Hebbebx Coleridge, Secre- 
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 An invaluable work to historical students and those interested in lingmstic pursuits. 
 
 This day, in crown 8vo., handsomely printed, price 7i'. dd., 
 
 Glossary of all the Words, Phrases, and Customs peculiar to Winchester 
 
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 Lost Beauties and Perishing Graces of the English Language. Revived 
 
 and Revivable in England and America. An appeal to authors, poets, clergymen, and public 
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 ' Ancient words 
 
 That come from the poetic quarry 
 
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 The Romany in Europe : a Complete History of the Gipsies since their 
 
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 various Laws enacted, &c., and the Books relating to them. By William Pinkekton, F.S.A., 
 F. A.S.L. — Preparing, in 8vo., handsomely printed. 
 An entirely original work upon this curious subject. Many of the notions which have long obtained con- 
 
 terning the origin and first appearance here of the Gipsies are now proved to be erroneous and without 
 
 the sUgbtest fomidation. 
 
 This day, price 6s. Gd., pp. 328 ; by post 7s., 
 
 Slang Dictionary; or, the Vulgar Words, Street Phrases, and 'Fast' 
 
 Expressions of High and Low Society ; many with their Etymology, and a few with their History 
 traced. With curious illustrations : Literary Slang ; Religious Slang; Fashionable Slang; Mili- 
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 keepers' Slang. 
 
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 ' Valuable as a work of reference.'— Saturd.4.y Review. 
 
 ' All classes of society will find amusement or instruction in its pages.'— Times. 
 
 BEST FRENCH LESSON BOOK EVER PUBLISHED. 
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 Vocahulaire Ssrmbolique. A Symbolic French and English Vocabulary 
 
 for Students of every age. By Raoonet. Illustrated by many hundred AVoodcut.^, exhibiting 
 familiar objects of every description, with French and English explanations, thus stamping the 
 French terms and phrases indelibly on the mind. 
 
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 yEAV BOOK BY PROFESSOR RENAN'S ASSOCIATE. 
 Exquisitely printed, 12mo., cloth, very neat, price 3s. 6rf., 
 
 ApoUonins of Tyana : the Pagan or False Christ of the Third Centnry. 
 
 An Essay. By Albert Reville, pastor of tlie Walloon Churcli at Rotterdam. Authorized 
 
 translation. 
 *,* A most curious account of an attempt to revive Paganism in the third century by mean of a false 
 Christ. Strange to say, the principal events in the life of Apollonius are almost identical witla the Gospel 
 tSMTatire. Apoilonius was bom in a mj-stenous way about the same time as Christ. After a period of pre- 
 y^ration came a Passion, then a Resmrection, and an Ascension. In many other respects the parallel is 
 ©iually estraordinary. 
 
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 Clii-istmas Carols, an entii-ely New Gathering of, Ancient and Modem, 
 
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 Ooriimon Prayer. Illustrated by Holbein and Albert Dnrer. With wood- 
 
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 also the Dance of Death, a singularly curious series after Holbein, with Scriptural Quotations 
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 Book of Common Prayer. Pickering"'s Sumptnons Folio Edition, printed 
 
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 English Chni'ch Furniture and Decorations at the Period of the Eefor- 
 
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 The hitherto Unknown Poem, written by John Bunyan, whilst confined in Bedford Jail, for the 
 
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 Profitable Meditations, Fitted to Man's Different Condition: in a Con- 
 ference between Christ and a Sinner. By John Buvvan, Servant to the Lord Jesus Christ. 
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 is. 6d. 
 'A highly-interesting memorial of the great allegoiist.'— Athen^um. 
 
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 yo^ ready, in 8vo., on tinted paper, nearly 350 pages, very neat, price Bs., 
 
 Family History of the English Counties : Descriptive Account of Twenty 
 
 Tliousand most Curious and Karo r>ool<s, Old Tracts, Ancient Manuscripts, Engravings, and 
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 In 1 vol., 4to., on tinted paper, with 19 large and most curious Plates in facsimile, 
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 Illuminated Charter-Eoll of Waterford, Temp. Richard II. Price to 
 
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 Of the very limited impression proposed, more than l.'^O copies have already been subscribed for. Amongst 
 the Corporation Sliminieiits of the City of Waterford is preserved an ancient. Illuminated Roll, of great 
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 Army Lists of the Soundlieads and Cavaliers in the Civil War. 
 
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 >. ow ready, 12mo., very choicely printed, price 6s. Gd., 
 
 Lcndcn Dii'ectciy for 1677. The Earliest Known List of the London 
 
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 This curious little volume has been reprinted verbatim from one of the only two copies known to be in 
 existence. It contains an Introduction pointing out some of the principal persons mentioned in tlie list. 
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 originators of many of titj great firms and co-partnerships wliich have pio.spered through two pregnant 
 centuries, and wl.ioh exis some of them in nearly the same namis at this day. Its moet di.stuictive featm-e is 
 the early sercrauee whic i it marks of 'gold.-miths lliat keep rmiuing cash-js,' precursors of the mo<.lcra 
 bankers, from the mass r. the merchants of London. 
 
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 Magna Charta. An Esact Facsimile of the Original Document 
 
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 3 feet long by 2 feet wide, with the Arms and Seals of the Barons elaborately emblazoned in gold 
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 Abbey." 
 A full translation, with Notes, has just been prepared, price Cd. 
 
 Folio, exquisitely printed on toned paper, with numerous Etchings, (fee, price 28s. 
 
 Millais Family, the Lineage and Pedigree of, recording its History 
 
 from 1331 to lsU5, by J. Behtrand Payne, with Illustrations from Designs by the Author. 
 
 Of tliis benutifvil volume only sisty copies have been privr.tely printed for presents to the several members 
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 ANTIQUARIAN AND HERALDIC BOOKS. 
 
 {See QUARTERLY REVIEW for July, 1865.) 
 
 Preparing, in small 4to., handsomely printed. 
 
 A List of the Anglo-Norman Families, from the different Battle Abbey 
 
 Eolls, Domesday Book, and the MSS. preserved in the Eccord and other I'ublic OtUces o( 
 England, <Sic., <tc. ; showing the Tnie Spelling, with the numerous and peculiar variations of tho 
 names of several thousand distinguished l-'amilics from Norniandj-, Flanders, the Netherlands, 
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 Brittany, who came over in the train of the Conqueror, anno" 10GG-lo07. 
 
 To the searcher after English familj- history the above woric will be of the greatest value. Tliere are but 
 few fauiiUes in this coimtrj- who cannot claim a relatiousliii) to one or other of the names mentioned in the 
 •List.' 
 
 HERALDRY OF WALES. 
 Only 50 copies printed, in marvellous facsimile, 4to., on old Welsh paper, half morocco, 12^. 6c;., 
 
 Display of Heranldry of the particular Coa,t Ai-moius now in use in 
 
 the Si.x Counties in Xorth Wales, and several others elsewhere ; with the Names of tlie Families, 
 whereby any man, knowing from wliat family he is descended, may know his particular Arms. 
 By John Reynolds, of Oswestry, Antiquarian; with nearly One Hundred Coat Armours 
 Blazoned in the Old Style. Chestei', printed 17J9. 
 
 From a Uniciue Copy, of priceless value to the lover of Heraldry and Genealogy. 
 In remarkable facsimile, from the rare original, small folio, 
 
 Caxton's Statutes of Henry VII., 14S9. Edited, with ITotes and Intro- 
 duction, by John Kae, Esq., Fellow of the Royal Institution. 
 
 This 1= the earliest knomi volume of Printed Statutes, an<l is fmther remrtrkablo as beiiis in English. It 
 contains some very cm-ious and primitive Legislation on Trade and Domestic Matters, such as : — 
 
 Price of Hats and Caps 
 French Wines 
 
 Act for Peopling Isle of Wight 
 Against Butchers 
 
 Giving of Li.very 
 Coucerniug Customa 
 Fires in London 
 Rebels in the Field 
 
 Correcting I'riests 
 Against Hunters 
 Marr.ving a Woman against her 
 Will, &C. 
 
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